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The Inner Courtyard: Stories by Indian Women
Inner Stories by Indian Women
204 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1994
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June 1, 2026
This collection, bought for 150 rupees from Delhi in 2005, waited for 21 years on my shelves (one of the few books I moved with me when I relocated) before I read it. I don't know if that's good or bad - maybe I wouldn't have appreciated it in the same way with so little life experience, or maybe it would have thrilled me even more at a fresher reading age. But I'm so glad I finally got around to it. I don't know how all of these stories are so good. So explosively or quietly good - in different ways. I didn't think much of contemporary Hindi literature back when we studied it in university but clealry we only went through the stale boring examples because the couple of stories translated from Hindi here, as well as all the stories translated from Malayalam, Kannada, Tamil, Urdu, and Bengali, were absolutely stunning. Draupadi by Mahasveta Devi, whom I was asomewhat familiar with but thought she was a bit of a propagandist or just too melodramatic in general, gave me whiplash and violent dreams. These stories, which comprise the first third of the collection, are also a showcase for how crucial a good translation is.
The stories deal mostly with familial relations, and I find it very curious how sidelined men are in them. To be honest, I find this radically feminist and very refreshing, I'm sick of feminism being always rerouted through women's relationship and orientation relative to men. They are mostly stories of grandmothers and children, of sisters, mothers and daughters, cousins, aunts. To the extent that men do appear, they're treated with a certain dismissal, as an unavoidable nuisance, or with contemptuous (and righteous) anger for their uselessness, for their obliviouslness, for their violence, and for their terrible power. I think the best stories here by far were the ones told from s child's perspective - so vibrant and alive, so believably child-eyed; and Draupadi, which stands out for its tone, subject matter, and enraged literary vigour.
The vast diversity contained in these stories is also worth mentioning - they are of Hindu and Muslim families, lower and middle classes, patriarchal and matriarchal communities, rural and urban, they deal with immigration, double identities, contain bilingualism, tackle political strife and domestic tensions, deal with religion, colonialism and its aftermath, social iniquity, and, obviously, feminism - again in a multitude of approaches and points of view.
A few words for each of them:
Revenge Herself by Lalitambika Antarjanam, translated from Malayalam by Vasanti Sankaranarayanan, 1930s - ****
A reimagining of a real story from the 19th century about a woman from Kerala, belonging to one of the highest and most restrictive Hindu castes there, becoming a prostitute. The author uses the framing of a ghost story to give the floor to the woman herself to tell her own story. It's a little preachy, which makes sense given the author's radical background as part of the Kerala Marxist Party. But the story itself is compelling and evocative enough to make up for the programmatic tone towards the end.
Akku by Vaidehi, translated from Kannada by Padma R. Sharma, 1980s - *****
A powerful "mad woman" story totally devoid of any sentimentality or pity for the sufferer. It's one of those stories that questions the boundary between sanity and insanity and who sets them, and for what ends. Akku is dismissed as crazy by everyone in her family since she abandoned all adherence ot convention after her husband left her to follow a sanyasi (holy man). I think this can be read as a violent rebellion against society tying women's worth entirely to a husband - it's like, well I don't have one now, I might as well just say what I really think, until it became a habit. It's also a story of resilience, of saying I will *not* be dismissed, I'm still here and I still have eyes and ears to see and hear your hypocrisy. In the end, .
Summer Vacation by Kamala Das, translated from Malayalam by Vasanti Sankaranarayanan and Asha Bijlani - *****
Possibly my favourite of the collection. It takes place in rural Kerala, in a matrilineal community called a tarawad consisting of a matriarch with her brothers and sisters and the children of all the sisters. The house they live in is also called a tarawad. In this story, a girl visits her grandmother for the summer in the eerily empty tarawad, dominated by the coconut grove planted in remembrance of all the people who lived there that have now passed. A poignant mood of remembrance and quiet pain wreathes out of the lyrical conversations between grandchild and grandmnother, giving the reader the context of this visit bit by bit and the likely future of the terawad and the two characters. It's a story of death, loss, but also regeneration and hope. It's absolutely beautiful and I'd recommend reading it if you had to choose just one from the book.
Memories of an Indian Childhood by Qurratulain Hyder, transled from Urdu by the author, 1970 - *****
A whimsical, winking story told through a child's eye about life in Dehra Dun just before Independence that easily blends mundane scenes involving pets and children, with gentle mocking of a middle class community overly concerned with appearances, with the tragedy of povery, both genteel and raw, with magical and fairy elements, and ancient traditions still huddled up in the hills like polyandry - all mixed up and filtered through a child's sensibility.
Girls by Mrinal Pande, translated from Hindi by Rama Baru, 1983 - ****
A more straightforward indictment of misogyny through the eyes of a girl on the brink of adolscence and her violent refusal to be assimilated in the female world her mother, grandmother, maasis and maamis inhabit - an impoverished world of serving men and their institutions while being constantly reminded they're second-class humans. I know these feelings pretty well from my own childhood and adolescence, even if my environment wasn't quite as overtly hostile to girls.
Rhythms by Lakshmi Kannan, translated from Tamil by the author, 1986 - ****
This is a very impressionistic short story, using rich descriptions of sound, smell, and images to invoke a mental painting, like a watercolour, which gradually changes under a shifting light. Thus the musical leitmotif accompanying the narrator from the start is eventually revealed to be a desperate cry of indictment for a "sleeping god". Ironically, even this is locked within the prescribed tradition of the temple the story takes place in - the disabled man berates the god in a nindastuti, a song wherein the devotee intimately criticises a god for its failings. As the Navagriha mural at the start of the story suggests, the Hinduist realm can encompass and absorb everything, even its own rejection.
Yellow Fish by Ambai (C. S. Lakshmi), translated from Tamil by Lakshmi Holmström, 1988 - *****
A two-page story about grief that will probably make you cry.
Chauthi ka Jaura by Ismat Chugtai, translated from Urdu by Safiya Saddiqui, mid-20th century - *****
A very poor widow is deseprate to marry off her elder daughter and keeps sewing new versions of a chauthi ka jaura, a fourth-day garment the bride wears for a visit to her mother's home after consummation. The constant sewing and her seemingly prodigious ability to manage with any scant scraps of cloth symbolise a sort of a desperate but unceasing hope for her daughter. When their cousin arrives for a few months, it seems like it's finally her time and the mother picks up her sewing once again, surrounded by neighbourhood women like a sort of a Greek chorus. The story is very harsh in its criticism of this cruel restriction on women - get married or basically die, and especially of men. The younger sister I think verbalises the author's feelings when she calls him a bastard, a fool, a wicked man, and hurls contemptuous abuse at him for turgidly vacuuming off the women's meagre resources with nary a thought about the fact that they're clearly starving to be able to feed him, like a great unfeeling black hole devouring all their timid hopes. I felt this kind of hate viscerally - for all the men living off women without realising or caring about all the unseen labour and sacrifice they benefit from; and then doing just as they please anyway because they don't believe women are owed anything for their efforts, for their devotion, for their work.
Draupadi by Mahasveta Devi, translated from Bengali by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (!!), 1978 - *****
Easily the most memorable of the stories, intensely political and highly dramatic, even melodramatic (there's some preachiness maybe, a bit of pomposity here and there, but it's all justified by the raw righteousness of the anger setting every word ablaze). The title of the collection it comes from, Agnigarbha - Womb of Fire - gives an appropiate idea of the kind of tone this story maintains from the first to the last word. Rooted in the epic story of Draupadi from the Mahabharata, this one elevates an Untouchable woman to the station of the queen from the epic, endowing her with endurance and faith in justice to set the whole of society on fire. The ending, almost mythical in its crescendo, left me dizzy. Standing
The First Party by Attia Hosain, 1953 - *****
The paradox of being forced to transgress against everything you're taught to hold sacred as a married woman because of the one imperative above all the rest - obedience to one's husband. Thematically it's very similar to Revenge Herself though the stories are very different.
The Farwell Party by Anita Desai, 1978 - ****
Interestingly, the only author I was very well acquainted with (did my thesis on Fasting, Feasting) was rather underwheling compared to the others here. Typically understated in her style (perhaps why she appeals so much to a western audience), she observes dispassionately and lets the reader take what they will from the story that unfolds. This one meditates on privacy and community and that rather absurdist phenomenon of people suddenly becoming much more cordial with people just as they're about to take their leave than while there was a chance to forge a real, sustained relationship with them.
My Beloved Charioteer by Shashi Deshpande, 1986 -*****
Another story about mnothers, daughters, and granddaughters, curiously devoid of men - well, except in the scars they left behind and the wedges they drove between the women. But it's also about women giving each other courage to face the damage and try to mend some, even in the face of certain futility (the beloved charioteer from the title refers to Krishna, who gave Arjuna courage before a hopeless battle).
The Meeting by Shama Futehally, 1987 - *****
Ungainly, graceless Sakina lives alone with her father and everyone knows she is never getting married. So much so that Sakina does not believe it when her father tells her there might be an offer for her - she's used to his mocking. I really liked that this story proposes an entirely uninteresting, unspecial, ugly and defeated heroine and asks the reader to care about her; and the reader does (well, I did). I also really liked that it doesn't find it necessary to give the man recognisable or plausible faults Masterful work.
The Library Girl by Vishwapriya L. Iyengar, 1985 - ***
This one is a bit obvious and flat in its indictment of the treatment of women in traditional societies, with the burqa becoming both a cage and a tool with the power to erase personalities and even one's personhood.
Birthday Deathday by Padma Hejmadi, 1985 - ***
I liked this one the least of all. Even though it contains one of the most dramatic and suspenseful scenes of the collection, it sounded smug and self-important to me. Singing odes to one's family members will always be tedious to anyone else listening (or reading), sorry.
The Gate-Keeper's Wife by Rukhsana Ahmad, 1980s - *****
The only story with a white protagonist. The white British lady who cares more about animals than the natives is given much more depth and complexity than I expected and her character arc leads to an unexpected place where her satisfaction comes not from exterting her power, proving her case, beign chastised, or making up for her cold-heartedness, but from a newfound point of convergence of her foreign ideas and the local ones.
Her Mother by Anjana Appachana, 1989 - *****
A little mystery told as a stream of consciousness interspersed with snippets of letters. It hit so close to home for many aspects of my own relationship to my parents. The only story where I underlined lines: "the anonymity drove them [Indian men] crazy" - I hadn't thought of it this way, but Indians have a very clear and very fixed idea of who they are in their communities, and it must be a struggle being transplanted into a context with no mooring.
"In an arranged marriage you will not be disillusioned, because you will not have any illusions to begin with."
"Your father is always enraptured with other women who stand up for themselves. If I stood up for myself, he would think that he was betrayed."
Dusty Distance by Suniti Namjoshi, 1988 - ****
A fable, page and a half, that serves as a sort of an epitaph for the entire collection, commenting on set ideas about who gets to be an artist and how.
The stories deal mostly with familial relations, and I find it very curious how sidelined men are in them. To be honest, I find this radically feminist and very refreshing, I'm sick of feminism being always rerouted through women's relationship and orientation relative to men. They are mostly stories of grandmothers and children, of sisters, mothers and daughters, cousins, aunts. To the extent that men do appear, they're treated with a certain dismissal, as an unavoidable nuisance, or with contemptuous (and righteous) anger for their uselessness, for their obliviouslness, for their violence, and for their terrible power. I think the best stories here by far were the ones told from s child's perspective - so vibrant and alive, so believably child-eyed; and Draupadi, which stands out for its tone, subject matter, and enraged literary vigour.
The vast diversity contained in these stories is also worth mentioning - they are of Hindu and Muslim families, lower and middle classes, patriarchal and matriarchal communities, rural and urban, they deal with immigration, double identities, contain bilingualism, tackle political strife and domestic tensions, deal with religion, colonialism and its aftermath, social iniquity, and, obviously, feminism - again in a multitude of approaches and points of view.
A few words for each of them:
Revenge Herself by Lalitambika Antarjanam, translated from Malayalam by Vasanti Sankaranarayanan, 1930s - ****
A reimagining of a real story from the 19th century about a woman from Kerala, belonging to one of the highest and most restrictive Hindu castes there, becoming a prostitute. The author uses the framing of a ghost story to give the floor to the woman herself to tell her own story. It's a little preachy, which makes sense given the author's radical background as part of the Kerala Marxist Party. But the story itself is compelling and evocative enough to make up for the programmatic tone towards the end.
Akku by Vaidehi, translated from Kannada by Padma R. Sharma, 1980s - *****
A powerful "mad woman" story totally devoid of any sentimentality or pity for the sufferer. It's one of those stories that questions the boundary between sanity and insanity and who sets them, and for what ends. Akku is dismissed as crazy by everyone in her family since she abandoned all adherence ot convention after her husband left her to follow a sanyasi (holy man). I think this can be read as a violent rebellion against society tying women's worth entirely to a husband - it's like, well I don't have one now, I might as well just say what I really think, until it became a habit. It's also a story of resilience, of saying I will *not* be dismissed, I'm still here and I still have eyes and ears to see and hear your hypocrisy. In the end, .
Summer Vacation by Kamala Das, translated from Malayalam by Vasanti Sankaranarayanan and Asha Bijlani - *****
Possibly my favourite of the collection. It takes place in rural Kerala, in a matrilineal community called a tarawad consisting of a matriarch with her brothers and sisters and the children of all the sisters. The house they live in is also called a tarawad. In this story, a girl visits her grandmother for the summer in the eerily empty tarawad, dominated by the coconut grove planted in remembrance of all the people who lived there that have now passed. A poignant mood of remembrance and quiet pain wreathes out of the lyrical conversations between grandchild and grandmnother, giving the reader the context of this visit bit by bit and the likely future of the terawad and the two characters. It's a story of death, loss, but also regeneration and hope. It's absolutely beautiful and I'd recommend reading it if you had to choose just one from the book.
Memories of an Indian Childhood by Qurratulain Hyder, transled from Urdu by the author, 1970 - *****
A whimsical, winking story told through a child's eye about life in Dehra Dun just before Independence that easily blends mundane scenes involving pets and children, with gentle mocking of a middle class community overly concerned with appearances, with the tragedy of povery, both genteel and raw, with magical and fairy elements, and ancient traditions still huddled up in the hills like polyandry - all mixed up and filtered through a child's sensibility.
Girls by Mrinal Pande, translated from Hindi by Rama Baru, 1983 - ****
A more straightforward indictment of misogyny through the eyes of a girl on the brink of adolscence and her violent refusal to be assimilated in the female world her mother, grandmother, maasis and maamis inhabit - an impoverished world of serving men and their institutions while being constantly reminded they're second-class humans. I know these feelings pretty well from my own childhood and adolescence, even if my environment wasn't quite as overtly hostile to girls.
Rhythms by Lakshmi Kannan, translated from Tamil by the author, 1986 - ****
This is a very impressionistic short story, using rich descriptions of sound, smell, and images to invoke a mental painting, like a watercolour, which gradually changes under a shifting light. Thus the musical leitmotif accompanying the narrator from the start is eventually revealed to be a desperate cry of indictment for a "sleeping god". Ironically, even this is locked within the prescribed tradition of the temple the story takes place in - the disabled man berates the god in a nindastuti, a song wherein the devotee intimately criticises a god for its failings. As the Navagriha mural at the start of the story suggests, the Hinduist realm can encompass and absorb everything, even its own rejection.
Yellow Fish by Ambai (C. S. Lakshmi), translated from Tamil by Lakshmi Holmström, 1988 - *****
A two-page story about grief that will probably make you cry.
Chauthi ka Jaura by Ismat Chugtai, translated from Urdu by Safiya Saddiqui, mid-20th century - *****
A very poor widow is deseprate to marry off her elder daughter and keeps sewing new versions of a chauthi ka jaura, a fourth-day garment the bride wears for a visit to her mother's home after consummation. The constant sewing and her seemingly prodigious ability to manage with any scant scraps of cloth symbolise a sort of a desperate but unceasing hope for her daughter. When their cousin arrives for a few months, it seems like it's finally her time and the mother picks up her sewing once again, surrounded by neighbourhood women like a sort of a Greek chorus. The story is very harsh in its criticism of this cruel restriction on women - get married or basically die, and especially of men. The younger sister I think verbalises the author's feelings when she calls him a bastard, a fool, a wicked man, and hurls contemptuous abuse at him for turgidly vacuuming off the women's meagre resources with nary a thought about the fact that they're clearly starving to be able to feed him, like a great unfeeling black hole devouring all their timid hopes. I felt this kind of hate viscerally - for all the men living off women without realising or caring about all the unseen labour and sacrifice they benefit from; and then doing just as they please anyway because they don't believe women are owed anything for their efforts, for their devotion, for their work.
Draupadi by Mahasveta Devi, translated from Bengali by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (!!), 1978 - *****
Easily the most memorable of the stories, intensely political and highly dramatic, even melodramatic (there's some preachiness maybe, a bit of pomposity here and there, but it's all justified by the raw righteousness of the anger setting every word ablaze). The title of the collection it comes from, Agnigarbha - Womb of Fire - gives an appropiate idea of the kind of tone this story maintains from the first to the last word. Rooted in the epic story of Draupadi from the Mahabharata, this one elevates an Untouchable woman to the station of the queen from the epic, endowing her with endurance and faith in justice to set the whole of society on fire. The ending, almost mythical in its crescendo, left me dizzy. Standing
The First Party by Attia Hosain, 1953 - *****
The paradox of being forced to transgress against everything you're taught to hold sacred as a married woman because of the one imperative above all the rest - obedience to one's husband. Thematically it's very similar to Revenge Herself though the stories are very different.
The Farwell Party by Anita Desai, 1978 - ****
Interestingly, the only author I was very well acquainted with (did my thesis on Fasting, Feasting) was rather underwheling compared to the others here. Typically understated in her style (perhaps why she appeals so much to a western audience), she observes dispassionately and lets the reader take what they will from the story that unfolds. This one meditates on privacy and community and that rather absurdist phenomenon of people suddenly becoming much more cordial with people just as they're about to take their leave than while there was a chance to forge a real, sustained relationship with them.
My Beloved Charioteer by Shashi Deshpande, 1986 -*****
Another story about mnothers, daughters, and granddaughters, curiously devoid of men - well, except in the scars they left behind and the wedges they drove between the women. But it's also about women giving each other courage to face the damage and try to mend some, even in the face of certain futility (the beloved charioteer from the title refers to Krishna, who gave Arjuna courage before a hopeless battle).
The Meeting by Shama Futehally, 1987 - *****
Ungainly, graceless Sakina lives alone with her father and everyone knows she is never getting married. So much so that Sakina does not believe it when her father tells her there might be an offer for her - she's used to his mocking. I really liked that this story proposes an entirely uninteresting, unspecial, ugly and defeated heroine and asks the reader to care about her; and the reader does (well, I did). I also really liked that it doesn't find it necessary to give the man recognisable or plausible faults Masterful work.
The Library Girl by Vishwapriya L. Iyengar, 1985 - ***
This one is a bit obvious and flat in its indictment of the treatment of women in traditional societies, with the burqa becoming both a cage and a tool with the power to erase personalities and even one's personhood.
Birthday Deathday by Padma Hejmadi, 1985 - ***
I liked this one the least of all. Even though it contains one of the most dramatic and suspenseful scenes of the collection, it sounded smug and self-important to me. Singing odes to one's family members will always be tedious to anyone else listening (or reading), sorry.
The Gate-Keeper's Wife by Rukhsana Ahmad, 1980s - *****
The only story with a white protagonist. The white British lady who cares more about animals than the natives is given much more depth and complexity than I expected and her character arc leads to an unexpected place where her satisfaction comes not from exterting her power, proving her case, beign chastised, or making up for her cold-heartedness, but from a newfound point of convergence of her foreign ideas and the local ones.
Her Mother by Anjana Appachana, 1989 - *****
A little mystery told as a stream of consciousness interspersed with snippets of letters. It hit so close to home for many aspects of my own relationship to my parents. The only story where I underlined lines: "the anonymity drove them [Indian men] crazy" - I hadn't thought of it this way, but Indians have a very clear and very fixed idea of who they are in their communities, and it must be a struggle being transplanted into a context with no mooring.
"In an arranged marriage you will not be disillusioned, because you will not have any illusions to begin with."
"Your father is always enraptured with other women who stand up for themselves. If I stood up for myself, he would think that he was betrayed."
Dusty Distance by Suniti Namjoshi, 1988 - ****
A fable, page and a half, that serves as a sort of an epitaph for the entire collection, commenting on set ideas about who gets to be an artist and how.
April 20, 2015
17 authors, 17 stories, 17 distinct styles of writing and one hell of a read! This is by far, one of the best books I have read and made feel like I am part of their stories! I could relate to most all the characters, sympathize and empathize with a lot of them and feel their pain! It made me question and rethink my view on so many things I have taken for granted in my life! Though all the stories were really good and well written, some of the stories that caught my eye are "Revenge Herself, The Meeting, The library girl and Chauthi ka Jaura". Every story has something to say and convey a powerful message to the reader! I am so glad I read this book! I had the most beautiful journey through the lives of so many characters who touched my heart, and I haven't returned empty handed! I have learnt a lesson or two from every story and these will the pearls of wisdom that will guide me through my life!
July 9, 2018
I've been recommending this to people right and left, ever since I picked it up in Delhi on a trip to see family/ fulfill various obligations, where I ended up literally disappearing into it.
Number One: it showed me that I had stories people might want to know about.
Number Two: it showed me how meaningless labels like "south asian women writers" are when writers from a full spectrum of experimental, realist, fabulist, popular, academic, sci-fi, etc are all considered.
Some of my favorites though I haven't sat down w/ this book in years: "Birthday Deathday" and "Blue Donkey" and the story by Mahesweta Devi translated by Gayatri C. Spivak and of course the story that made me all weepy and smiling: "Her Mother." It takes the overwrought quality of a certain kind of maternal love and somehow sets it on its head - mocking it yet at the same time making you feel it. A gem.
Number One: it showed me that I had stories people might want to know about.
Number Two: it showed me how meaningless labels like "south asian women writers" are when writers from a full spectrum of experimental, realist, fabulist, popular, academic, sci-fi, etc are all considered.
Some of my favorites though I haven't sat down w/ this book in years: "Birthday Deathday" and "Blue Donkey" and the story by Mahesweta Devi translated by Gayatri C. Spivak and of course the story that made me all weepy and smiling: "Her Mother." It takes the overwrought quality of a certain kind of maternal love and somehow sets it on its head - mocking it yet at the same time making you feel it. A gem.
June 21, 2017
The stories are women-centric, yet, they are different from your average short story collection by women. Lakshmi has curated such dazzling stories from regional languages as well as English. They cover different aspects of feminist writing. As she mentions in the introduction, she didn't decide the theme of her book as 'feminism'. But, they are feminist, as Lakshmi says, in the sense that they offer a woman's perspective.
This book is a delightful collection of stories showing the complexity of women writing.
This book is a delightful collection of stories showing the complexity of women writing.
January 21, 2022
Rating: 3.75
The Inner Courtyard is an anthology of 18 short stories by Indian women writers; writers who write within India, writers who write from outside India, writers who originally write in English and others whose works have been translated to be included here.
"Did you know that the language in some of the Vedic texts has no present tense? Because the moment a word is uttered, it is past." - Padma Hejmadi
There are stories by renowned authors such as Kamala Das, Ismat Chughtai, Anita Desai, Mahasweta Devi and Attia Hosain, but I also discovered new writers such as Qurratulain Hyder, Lalitambika Antarjanam, Shashi Deshpande and Padma Hejmadi, among others.
The editor mentions in the acknowledgments that she wanted to stay away from the notion of the third world/women's story in this book, which she has done by including stories featuring women of all classes and religions. There are stories featuring Muslim women, Hindu women, women from backward castes in different regions, revolutionary women, etc. They all feature strong female characters, but each possesses a distinctive writing style owing to their different writers.
"It is not the dead who need your compassion...it is the living. Not the dead who crave for loyalty, but the living." - Shashi Deshpande
I particularly loved 'Revenge Herself', 'Memories of an Indian Childhood', 'Draupadi', 'My Beloved Chairoteer' and 'The Library Girl' from this book. These stories had beautiful writing, conveyed a lot in a few words and had plots that kept me wanting more. Short story collections are a good way to be introduced to new authors, at least for me. If an author can keep me hooked to a short story, I feel inclined to check out their other work.
This is a backlist title that I picked up from my college library. I have been told it's not in print anymore and a physical copy is hard to find. But in case you do find a copy in some format, it's definitely worth reading.
The Inner Courtyard is an anthology of 18 short stories by Indian women writers; writers who write within India, writers who write from outside India, writers who originally write in English and others whose works have been translated to be included here.
"Did you know that the language in some of the Vedic texts has no present tense? Because the moment a word is uttered, it is past." - Padma Hejmadi
There are stories by renowned authors such as Kamala Das, Ismat Chughtai, Anita Desai, Mahasweta Devi and Attia Hosain, but I also discovered new writers such as Qurratulain Hyder, Lalitambika Antarjanam, Shashi Deshpande and Padma Hejmadi, among others.
The editor mentions in the acknowledgments that she wanted to stay away from the notion of the third world/women's story in this book, which she has done by including stories featuring women of all classes and religions. There are stories featuring Muslim women, Hindu women, women from backward castes in different regions, revolutionary women, etc. They all feature strong female characters, but each possesses a distinctive writing style owing to their different writers.
"It is not the dead who need your compassion...it is the living. Not the dead who crave for loyalty, but the living." - Shashi Deshpande
I particularly loved 'Revenge Herself', 'Memories of an Indian Childhood', 'Draupadi', 'My Beloved Chairoteer' and 'The Library Girl' from this book. These stories had beautiful writing, conveyed a lot in a few words and had plots that kept me wanting more. Short story collections are a good way to be introduced to new authors, at least for me. If an author can keep me hooked to a short story, I feel inclined to check out their other work.
This is a backlist title that I picked up from my college library. I have been told it's not in print anymore and a physical copy is hard to find. But in case you do find a copy in some format, it's definitely worth reading.
March 4, 2020
Fantastic book and something I feel everyone should read. I love how diverse the authors are, in their themes and sentimentality, yet how they connect on this one platform, a kind of intimacy I feel that Indians especially women share, without even knowing. I don't even know if that makes sense or if I am being too poetic.
I do have a mixed reaction regarding the stories. Didn't really appreciate 'Draupadi' because I remember reading it a long time back when I was writing a paper for class, and articles on the story didn't really leave a favourable impression on me. Devi becomes problematic if you read the story from the aadivasi perspective, but then the message she's trying to convey is pretty direct and well presented so I guess it's fine as long as we don't slip into the conceit of assuming something about groups we know nothing of. But as I have already mentioned, my criticism of this particular story largely comes from what we've done in the class. I am sure if I write papers on other stories, I'll find them problematic as well.
I really liked 'Revenge herself' and 'The Library Girl'. Mrinal Pandey's 'Girls' was a trip down the memory lane (we had it for our 12th boards) 'Rhythms' was a synaesthetic experience, 'summer vacation' was another delightful tale (I do confess that my bias comes from my love for Kamala Das)
I'd definitely recommend this book to anyone who's interested in short stories, feminist writing, Indian authors and especially women authors. Honestly, this is one book I wish for everyone to read. You might discover new authors (I did), you might indulge in the old ones. It's a good experience, not chilling or disturbing, yet leaving you with a lingering sense of dissatisfaction mixed with a desire for more. 😀
I do have a mixed reaction regarding the stories. Didn't really appreciate 'Draupadi' because I remember reading it a long time back when I was writing a paper for class, and articles on the story didn't really leave a favourable impression on me. Devi becomes problematic if you read the story from the aadivasi perspective, but then the message she's trying to convey is pretty direct and well presented so I guess it's fine as long as we don't slip into the conceit of assuming something about groups we know nothing of. But as I have already mentioned, my criticism of this particular story largely comes from what we've done in the class. I am sure if I write papers on other stories, I'll find them problematic as well.
I really liked 'Revenge herself' and 'The Library Girl'. Mrinal Pandey's 'Girls' was a trip down the memory lane (we had it for our 12th boards) 'Rhythms' was a synaesthetic experience, 'summer vacation' was another delightful tale (I do confess that my bias comes from my love for Kamala Das)
I'd definitely recommend this book to anyone who's interested in short stories, feminist writing, Indian authors and especially women authors. Honestly, this is one book I wish for everyone to read. You might discover new authors (I did), you might indulge in the old ones. It's a good experience, not chilling or disturbing, yet leaving you with a lingering sense of dissatisfaction mixed with a desire for more. 😀
December 31, 2022
A stellar collection that features some of the greats of Indian literature such Mahasweta Devi, Kamala Das, Ismat Chugtai, Shashi Despande and Anita Desai but also containing some new to me authors whose work I’d happily read in the future. There is a story about a woman who becomes a prostitute to please her husband, another about a woman’s desire to give birth to a boy so she can finally stop becoming pregnant because boys are superior to girls. Stories where women come together and support one another and others where they clash.
Favorites include Mahasweta Devi’s hard hitting Draupadi about a female freedom fighter, Anita Desai’s Farewell Party that looks at class and social standing in a portrait of one woman and the short but heartbreaking Yellow Fish by Ambai. Others include, My Beloved Charioteer by Shashi Deshpande that looks at a mother/daughter relationship and Her Mother by Anjana Appachana with a mother reflecting on her daughter who lives in America.
There are no mediocre stories, however, in this collection, each one contains the rich culture of India, shows the position of women in society at different periods of history, the connections between family and social class and much more.
Favorites include Mahasweta Devi’s hard hitting Draupadi about a female freedom fighter, Anita Desai’s Farewell Party that looks at class and social standing in a portrait of one woman and the short but heartbreaking Yellow Fish by Ambai. Others include, My Beloved Charioteer by Shashi Deshpande that looks at a mother/daughter relationship and Her Mother by Anjana Appachana with a mother reflecting on her daughter who lives in America.
There are no mediocre stories, however, in this collection, each one contains the rich culture of India, shows the position of women in society at different periods of history, the connections between family and social class and much more.
July 31, 2023
Published in 1991, this edited volume is a collection of 18 short stories by women authors who have shaped women’s writing in India.
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From Kamala Das, Ismat Chugtai to Mahasweta Devi and Shashi Deshpande, the collection is eclectic. The stories mostly deal with experiences of girlhood and the inherent struggles in a patriarchal society.
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My favourite from the collection are undoubtedly Mahasweta Devi’s Draupadi about the abuse of a tribal woman in the hands of security forces and her powerful mode of protest, Mrinal Pande’s Girls dealing with son preference and Vishwapriya Iyengar’s The Library Girl which talks about purdah and the question of choice.
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Interesting, engrossing and from varied settings, the stories dealt with the predicament of women in patriarchal societies.
🌹🌹
From Kamala Das, Ismat Chugtai to Mahasweta Devi and Shashi Deshpande, the collection is eclectic. The stories mostly deal with experiences of girlhood and the inherent struggles in a patriarchal society.
🌹🌹
My favourite from the collection are undoubtedly Mahasweta Devi’s Draupadi about the abuse of a tribal woman in the hands of security forces and her powerful mode of protest, Mrinal Pande’s Girls dealing with son preference and Vishwapriya Iyengar’s The Library Girl which talks about purdah and the question of choice.
🌹🌹
Interesting, engrossing and from varied settings, the stories dealt with the predicament of women in patriarchal societies.
July 26, 2020
I do not often get a chance to dive into short stories. During my summer in India, I loved reading this book. It gave me real insights into the deep richness of Indian culture and heritage through female authors from all over the country. Throughout the summer, I found being in India helped me understand the book and reading the book helped me understand India.
July 13, 2019
Must read for all Indians and outside!
January 3, 2020
Good
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 10, 2012
Well written but frankly left me wandering lost far outside my cultural milieu without even a signpost to guide me. Which made me think that the Indian writers I've loved (like Rushdie, Roy and Indian-Canadian Anita Rau Badami) are maybe writing with a more western audience in mind, or are masters of bridging cultural gaps. Or, I might just not be smart enough for this book.
January 2, 2008
A fantastic collection of stories written in many different styles. It helps to have a brief knowledge/understanding on Indian history and culture to truly understand some of the stories, but it can also serve as an introduction to help you focus on a particular time/aspect of history and culture.
June 25, 2015
I generally lean more towards short stories, and this an amazing book. An engaging collection of some of the finest Indian women writers. Every short story conveys a strong message. Selection, compilation and translation by Laxmi hölmstrom is perfect.
July 7, 2012
Some Really outstanding contribution by women writers of the indian sub continent. Worth reading.
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October 25, 2013Short stories by some great Indian women...worth a read.
October 1, 2015
I want to read this book
March 28, 2020
I want to add this book to my collection but can't find it anywhere.. any idea where would I get it??
March 4, 2016
Some of the best pieces of writing I've ever read in my life. An exquisite collection.
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