My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     "The Daughter of Man” is by Lalithambika Antharjanam. You may recall her earlier story “In the Shroud” posted on June 16. This story shows the impact of the Land Reform Act enacted by the democratically elected Communist Government in Kerala and how it impoverished the wealthy land owners.

     Based on the land relations and regulation under the British Raj, at the time of independence, India inherited a semi-feudal agrarian system, with ownership of land concentrated in the hands of a few individual landlords. The Land Reform Act set an absolute ceiling on the land a family could own. The tenants and hut dwellers received a claim in the excess land, on which they had worked for centuries.

     The upper class land owners lived well from leasing land to people who cultivated it and paid the land owner a significant part of the income from their hard work. When the Reform Act took effect the size of the land a person could own was drastically reduced and leasing became unlawful. Tenants who lived and worked on the land got at least a tenth of an acre as their own. Land owners who considered the number of tenants as a sign of their status in society lost the most when each tenant had to be given a tenth of an acre.

     The story is about a generous Nampoothiri woman who routinely feeds the hungry people around her house on a daily basis before she has her meal, while her family was rich. But after the Land Reform Act takes effect her family loses all the income. These upper class land owners know no other way of making a living other than leasing the land they owned. Slowly, they sell whatever land is left, piece by piece and in the end there is nothing left to sell. This generous woman and her family become so poor that she wants to send her grandson to school just for him to get the free lunch given there.

     For getting him admitted to school she asks the help of a politician who practically grew up in her house, but has forgotten all about it. Hearing her request he realizes what an ungrateful man he has been. Kneeling before her he asks for her forgiveness for being an ungrateful, vicious man. He says, “We (the politicians) destroyed your house. We were the reason for your not getting rent. In our fight for the poor, we forgot the hands that fed them. … Even now you are showering blessings on us. They are more powerful than your curse….I have one request….Please pass on this love, affection and sincerity to the next generation. Only your heart is still filled with these qualities.”

     He sends his apology to the organizers of a political meeting he was to attend saying, “There are some more important matters that I must finally deal with. I am the son of the Daughter of Man.”

The car that is waiting to take him to the meeting takes the woman back to her house.

Achamma Chandersekaran

Blog: http://achammachander.blogspot.com/

Website: http://www.achammachander.com/

India Edition: www.rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com

Kindle Edition of "Daughters of Kerala" on Amazon.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     "Arya Reborn" by Chandramathy is a complicated story as is life in a joint family. Written in the early nineties, it reflects the complications of the time, including college students experimenting with drugs.

     Arya is growing up in her ancestral home where Muthassan (grandfather) is still in complete control of all financial matters.

     One day as Muthassi (grandmother) is getting ashes for pooja from a kudukka – a globular pot made from the hard shell of a gourd like fruit-hung from the A-frame of the house, Muthassan kicks her from behind and she falls down and dies. Arya is at an age when she imitates sword fight using broomsticks.

     Muthassan follows the dead body being taken for cremation crying aloud and eliciting sympathetic remarks from others: “She is gone leaving no one to take care of him in his old age.” But he resolves that problem easily. After the 16the day prayer for the deceased the cook who used to sleep at the foot of the stairs, moves up to grandfather’s room and takes control of everything in the house. As a symbol of that authority she carries a bunch of keys that locks everything in the house. After two weeks Muthassan takes her to the temple, dressed in an expensive silk saree and wearing several pieces of gold jewelry, making her position in the house legal.

     Arya’s mother is a stubborn woman who always looks disagreeable and ready to punish Arya for the least thing. She doesn’t know what love is and never has a kind word for anyone. After Muthassan remarries, Arya’s father wants her mother to go with him to his small house along with Arya, but she refuses. Finally, she ends up being the servant to the stepmother and doing all the household chores.

     Meanwhile, Arya’s father finds a pretty woman who dresses well and can play veena for him. They have a child who looks like the father. But life is not happy and he takes to drinking and starts beating up the woman.

     All the cooking, cleaning and washing is too much for Arya’s mother and one day she vomits blood and dies. Arya comes home from the hostel and sits at the head of the body laid out in the foyer, feeling no emotion. Nobody has any tears for her mother. Seeing her being taken for cremation makes Arya feel relieved of the responsibility for the mother.

     After going back to the hostel Arya decides to try taking ganja (marijuana.) The impact of whatever tablet her friend gives her is unbelievable. Her uncles are sent for and they take her to sanitarium where a member of a women’s organization visits her along with her husband, Menon. She promises to help Arya resettle in one of the homes run by the organization.

     In the end, the home Arya goes to is the one where Menon’s mother lives. She welcomes Arya who is happy to be in a pleasant atmosphere. But her thoughts go to having someone (Menon) to wait for, all dressed up, learning to play veena for him and having children who will look like him. The story is worth reading.

Achamma Chandersekaran

Blog: http://AchammaChander.blogspot.com
Website: www.AchammaChander.com
India Edition: www.rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com
Kindle Edition on Amazon.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

       “One Still Picture Cannot Capture a Life’s Story” by Gita Hiranyan

     Marie Varghese who reviewed "Daughters of Kerala" remarked that 'One Still Picture Cannot Capture a Life's Story’ offers fascinating insights into the intersections of women's roles in relation to social class—the working poor and the Malayalee elite.

     Azhakamma, the young girl who used walk to school with her friends in long blue skirts, with hair plaited coming down on both sides, a gold necklace and a carefree attitude becomes an orphan when lightning strikes her hut and kills her mother making her an orphan, and knocks her down unconscious.

     After she wakes up she is forced to drop out of school and earn a living cleaning houses and washing dishes for four families, everyday. She is willing to clean all the rooms, but not the toilet, even when the mistress of the house reminds her that Kasturba Gandhi (Mahatma Gandhi’s wife) used to do it. The day the story takes place, Azhakamma is angry at the whole world for everyone reminding her about cleaning the toilet.

     Having to work in four houses everyday gives her little time for personal care or grooming, leaving her hair and body smelling. When she looks at herself in the mirror in the upstairs room she goes to clean, she imagines her image admonishing her for not taking better care of herself and not dressing better, and not wearing even a ‘bindi’ on the forehead.

     Gone are the days she used to dress up for school. Azhakamma has completed eighth grade and the daughter of the house where the story takes place, Ramyakutty, considers her educated enough to ask the cleaning girl for the correct spelling of a difficult word, ‘bougainvilla’ or ‘bougenvilla.’ Some times they watch TV together and both are crazy about cinema actors.

     The cook in the house has sympathy for Azhakamma and advices her to get a government job as at least a janitor so that she doesn’t have to run to four houses and get her hands all blistered with the cleaning materials. The cook gives her special food like fried fish without the knowledge of the mistress of the house, though she just throws it out saying that the bones of the stolen fish will get stuck in her throat.

     Azhakamma is most hurt when someone mentions that she has no husband or children. Men in the area know that her mother has gotten an astrologer to write the name of Azhakamma’s lover in her past life on a small gold disk on a black string that is tied around her hip to protect her from men.

     The last part of the story is her version of her life story, proving her Malayalam teacher’s remark, “You know how to write.” But there is no one to read or listen to her story.

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

“The Lies My Mother Told Me”

     In this story by Ashitha, what stands out is the lack of communication and love in family relationships. The Father is a terror to the other members of the family and the workers who come to the house and the fields. The mother is not truthful to the daughter and has set up many rules for her. The only people the girl can talk to freely are the workers from the “poor, uncultured, unreal world, but more free and happy.”

     The girl’s experience growing up in such a household made her realize that many grownups are not truthful in what they say and make up stories that sound good. Her father shows some kind of softness in appearance and behavior only when her mother’s relative Chellammakka is around. The parents always fight about her but when she commits suicide, the mother pretends to be sad and unhappy. Thinking that the death would put a stop to the arguments her parents had over her, the girl wants to know if her mother is happy this woman is dead. The mother is shocked.

     The girl grows up and is ready for marriage. The day the young woman is getting married her mother tells her about the new responsibilities she will have to take on. Part of that is what the young woman discovers as a “stone studded lie,” that the only way to a man’s heart is through “cooking and feeding on time.” The young woman works in the kitchen for hours to make tasty food and feeds her husband on time. But when she in bed with him she realizes that he is looking for “bigger breasts and thighs.” She realizes that “just like preparing food, I had to prepare for love also.” She felt harshly betrayed by her mother.

     The young woman finally acquires the language of her mother, grandmother and all the women before them, the language of silence. “We learned the art of talking contradiction and denial when we had to talk, and practiced self-denial.”

     One day the young woman’s daughter clumsily drapes a saree on and comes to show her mother how much they look alike. The mother is shocked to see the similarities and realizes that along with the looks, the habits also will be passed down from generation to generation.

     In time, this young woman learns to lie about things in such a way as to make them sound good. The person she has lied to most, she says, is her mother.

Achamma Chandersekaran
Blog: http://achammachander.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.achammachander.com/
India Edition: www.rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com



Kindle edition of "Daughter of Kerala" on Amazon.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     Johny Plathottam's "Amma"  (Mother) says the story of a rich woman.
Interestingly, and perhaps ironically, being rich does not get Amma out of the kitchen though her family is rich enough for her to have many servants.

     The kitchen is a spacious room full of huge cabinets, cupboards made of black wood with glass and wire screen doors, tall shelves full of crockery and things like refrigerator and washing machine that most houses do not have. Servants come to clean the vessels, grind spices and do work around the house. But the man of the house has an ‘aristocratic stipulation’, only Amma is allowed to do things in the kitchen and dining room, servants are not. So the kitchen is the world Amma lives in.

     When they were little the children followed her around in the kitchen. But once they started going to school they are mostly in their rooms upstairs and had only one thing to do—study. They also have their own things to do, learning to ride the bike and play tennis and don’t have much interaction with Amma. When breakfast is set on the table Amma would call them to come down to have breakfast, but they almost never interact with her. All meals are served that way.

     They know their mother through the variety of items that come to the table for their sumptuous meals and her affectionate call to come to have their meals.

     As she lived, the kitchen is where Amma is found dead --in the narrow path between the cabinets and cooking vessels stacked up high, with a cooking spoon in her outstretched arm. The forensic professor friend who joins the doctor for the autopsy remarks that Amma’s death was like the engine that stopped working because it was tired of running, but one thing seems unnatural to him: “Her dead body seemed very old as if the death took place months or even years ago, …yet, the body had not deteriorated.” We are left with the question: when did she actually die?

     Her son who lives at home with her tries to remember when he actually saw her or talked to her, but he is not able to. He has been too busy with his work and couldn’t even come home for her birthday. No one, it seems, had time for her.

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My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     "A Rented House" is written by Sachidanandan who also writes under the name Anand. He is a trendsetter who has written several books --philosophical works and about issues of social importance-- and has received numerous awards. He demonstrated extraordinary courage of conviction in rejecting two prestigious awards.


     “A Rented House” is about a couple who lives in rented houses just long enough for the writer husband to complete a project. When they leave the “Comfortable old fashioned house, situated in beautiful surroundings,” that they had rented last, the wife, Vimala, wonders why they never want to own something and stay at one place just to live there not just use it to accomplish something.

     The surroundings of this last house are indeed beautiful, with clusters of tall bamboo trees, a small river running along the periphery of the village, a path rather than a road that Vimala can see from the second floor of the house, villagers driving their cattle home in the evening—-the whole scene has captured Vimala’s heart. Although it is very different from the city they are used to living in, Vimala does not want to leave this place in a hurry. She wonders why she and her husband never want to settle down in one place.

     The thought comes up because of the situation of the woman who takes care of their needs at this old fashioned house. This woman used to be the companion to the former owner of the house who lived in grand style and had parties with entertainments which the woman used to oversee.

     She took care of him while he was sick until he died. After his death, she has no claim to the property and no special position to live in style. The one who bought the house has kept her to take care of the guests who rent the place. It is only the memories of the events that took place in the house while she lived with the rich owner that keep her there. She would rather live there even as a servant than leave the house only because she has memories that she doesn’t want to forget.

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My book "Daughters of Kerala"

Gracy


     In my blog on Working Women I wrote about “Fraction.” This story is by Gracy who is well known for writing very concise short-stories. There are two more stories by Gracy in the book, “Baby Doll” and “When a Star is Falling.”

     "Baby Doll" is about an innocent 12 year old who has not fully developed mentally and behaves like an 8-year old but has the looks of a17 year old. She loves dolls and treats them like her friends. A college student neighbor uses this fact to trick her when her parents are out to visit a neighbor who had an accident, in the hospital. They had given strict instructions to the young girl not to open the door, but to talk to anyone who rang the door bell through the window. When the young man promises to give her a live doll she is so thrilled that she forgets her mother’s instructions and opens the door wide to follow him to his room. She has no clue as to what his intentions are or how she will get the live doll.

     Unsuspecting young girls being sexually exploited by men is true the world over. If they are vulnerable the situation is worse because, as the mother explains the reason for her anxiety about her daughter, “Times are bad.”

     “When a Star is Falling” is about a young, rich woman who lives in a house that looks like a palace, and has cars and other luxuries. But the housewife looks sad because her husband “is a thief” who steals “women’s chastity,” she tells a real thief who had targeted her house to steal from. She considers a falling star a great wonder, though her beautiful, younger sister used to tease her saying that the stars got scared seeing her and were running away.

     Being wealthy alone does not guarantee a happy life. Many aspects of life have to come together for a person's happiness.

Achamma Chandersekaran

Website: http://www.achammachander.com/

India Edition: www.rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     Madhavikutty was also known as Kamala Das, and Kamala Surayya when she converted to Islam at the age of 65. She is arguably the most important feminist Malayalam writer in the last five decades. Kamala Das is better known outside of Kerala than most other Malayalam writers as she was a prolific writer in both Malayalam and English. She travelled to many countries to read her poems and in 2009 was named “the mother of modern English Indian Poetry” by The Times.


     Madhavikutty came from a family of distinguished writers. She wrote chiefly of love, its betrayal and the resulting anguish. In her autobiography she discussed her search for love inside and outside marriage. “My Story” shocked the readers and set a new milestone for women to write candidly about sexuality. Even her conversion to Islam was part of that search. But again she was disappointed.

     Madhavikutty’s story selected for this book “Sandalwood for the Funeral Pyre” is a unique one. It is about the cremation of the woman of a house, a wife and mother of three grown sons. From the conversation of her sons and their wives while the pyre is burning one can learn about her personal characteristics and how important a role she played in the lives of her husband and sons.

     The discussion about the care of the father is enlightening—how everyone is too busy with their work and social outings to take care of him. Another interesting discussion is about who will inherit the diamond earrings the old lady had.

     The oldest son who feels guilty that he didn’t give her anything while she was alive because she didn’t ask him, consoles himself saying: “When Amma was alive I did not do anything significant for her. But now I realized one wish. I was able to afford sandalwood for her funeral pyre. I am a lucky person. There is no doubt about it”.

     Read the story and draw your own conclusion.

My book Daughters of Kerala

     Karur (Karoor) Neelakandha Pillai was a school teacher who was an eminent short story writer. He wrote simple stories about the poor, but his stories almost always have a happy ending. His first story in the book "The Devil’s Jacket" is unique.

     A 10 year old boy, Kuttappan, has to support himself and his widowed sick mother. He makes a living by transporting commuters from one side of a lake to the other in a row boat that he inherited from his father-- his only inheritance.

     The boy doesn’t even have enough clothes to wear to keep warm on cold mornings. One day one of the passengers forgets a package on his boat. When Kuttappan opens the packet he is happy to find a shirt and a pair of shorts. He tries them on and thinks he looks like a policeman. But his mother insists on him being honest and returning the packet to the rightful owner. Kuttappan leaves the package on the boat where the passengers can see it. The owner has to identify what is in the package.

     After a few days a man comes on the boat and sees the package. He happens to be a rich business man who appreciates the boy’s honesty and wants to reward him in a big way.

     In the second story "Wooden Dolls" a young woman named Nalini is indignant when the census taker suggests she is a dependent. Rather than stay with her alcoholic husband she is back at her mother’s house and does everything that needs to be done in the house. In addition, she makes a living by carving statuettes from left over pieces of wood and selling them—an appropriate way for a member of a carpenter family to earn a living. In the end the census taker puts down her profession as ‘wood carving.’

     The census taker also is an artist and before leaving he gives her a piece of paper on which he had sketched her while they were talking. She is so pleased that she gives him a statuette of Parvathy (Consort of Shiva) in penitential pose.

     By the way, "Wooden Dolls" was staged as a play about six years ago by the South Asian Young Professionals group at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, University of Maryland.

     A big "Thank you" to those who posted comments.

     Web site: http://www.Achammachander.com

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My book "Daughters of Kerala"

Kerala Nuns Saving a Sikh Woman and Her Son

     N.S. Madhavan’s "When Big Trees Fall" is about the turbulent time in Delhi after the assassination of Indira Gandhi. (In a speech given by Rajiv Gandhi after the assassination of his mother, he said, “When big trees fall the earth trembles.”)

     Sectarian violence erupts after the assassination of Indira Gandhi, there is chaos everywhere and the Sikhs are being massacred by the Hindus. A number of them take refuge in the Gurudwara (place of worship) which is guarded by men ready to face the attackers. But they are attacked. Amarjit’s husband and grown son are killed by a man who has a shop next to theirs. He had been trying to buy the shop to expand his business and uses the chaotic occasion to kill the man and his family. But when he pulls Amajit’s hand she bites him hard to release the grip, drags her son and runs. In the darkness of the night they climb through the cracks in the wall and get in side the convent. The nuns give them warm milk, food to eat and a place to sleep. They can hear the motor bikes of the men who followed Amarjit circling the convent and shouting for the woman and boy to be released. The Gurkha gatekeeper locks the gate, chains it and waits inside.

     During the night stones are thrown at the convent which is a retirement home for old nuns who had worked in Delhi and surrounding areas. The arrival of Amarjit and her son seems to have given new energy and a purpose to the old nuns. The people chasing the woman and boy come to the convent and are beating on the gate asking for their release. Everyone knows that the mother and son cannot stay in the convent for long. So the superior, after praying for a long while, comes up with a plan.

     Amarjit is to dress like a nun and the boy whose hair is cut is to lie down in a coffin. The nuns are to take the coffin to the cemetery in an ambulance as if for burial. Once they are in the cemetery, out of site of people, they can go out another way and escape.

     The attackers try to stop them, but a Spanish nun who is in the group speaks to them in Hindi and asks why they are bothering the dead. Her accent and blue eyes didn’t go with the looks of Delhi and the young men leave the ambulance alone and go away. On reaching the cemetery, when no one is interested in them any more, they open the coffin and the boy gets up like a butterfly coming out of the pupa. From there they go to the railway station and get on a train to safety along with a visiting nun who is also leaving Delhi.

     The next day the residents of the convent go back to their old life of waiting for the end and the superior thinks she can feel death in the air that would take place very soon.

     This story was selected to represent the thousands of young Kerala women who become nuns to serve the poor in other parts of India and abroad.

     India edition of “Daughters of Kerala” available from:      www.Rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com

Web link: http://www.AchammaChander.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

Two Young Muslim Women

     There are two stories in “Daughters of Kerala” about young Muslim women whose husbands are away working to make a living. The main character in "Nerchakkottan" (Sacrificial animal), Sulaiyakutty has a pet lamb that she cares for from the time it is born. It is killed for Bakrid, the festival marking the end of the 30 day fast, as it was meant for that. Shortly after that her father dies. Because she is a fatherless child, the elders in the village take a collection to get her married to a man working in the gulf. When his vacation is over the groom goes back to the Gulf, leaving a pregnant Sulaiyakutty. She is not able to handle her life of “Thirty-five months of separation and one month of married life,” as the author puts it. She becomes insane, doesn’t take care of the baby and is brought back to her house without the baby. A letter arrives three days later with the news of the divorce. In the end Sulaiyakutty is found dead after she escapes from the mental asylum her brother has taken her to.

     This is a story about a married woman who lives far away from her husband. They represent the thousands in similar situations because the men go away for two to three years at a stretch to work in the Middle East and elsewhere, leaving the wife to toil in the kitchen and attend to other household chores. Some of these women can get caught in the down swirl of problems arising out of the situation from which they are unable to get out.

     On the other hand, this kind of separation has a positive impact on Ameena in "The Dawn of Enlightenment." She wants to make sure her daughter receives at least a basic education. Ameena has problems because she doesn’t know to read and write. The mail man has to take her hand to get the thumb print instead of her signature on the money order she gets from her husband who is in the Navy. She also has to depend on him to read her husband’s letters to her and write her response to her husband. Ameena wants to make sure that “Kafir wouldn’t touch” her daughter’s hand. For that she sends her daughter to school to learn to read and write.

     The situations are similar in the two stories, but the ways the two women handle them are poles apart.

     India Edition of “Daughters of Kerala” is available from: Rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com

My book "Daughters of Kerala"

     There are stories in the collection that are unique to Kerala culture. The earliest story written in 1931, “In the Shroud” by Lalithambika Antharjanam seems unreal today, especially the ways in which women were subjugated not only by men but also by what the women believed. After reaching puberty a woman was not to see or be seen by any man other than her husband, while it was customary for an upper-caste Namputhiri to take several women as wives. (Brahmins in Kerala are known as Namputhiris.) A man of sixty taking a young woman of twenty as his third or fourth wife was not uncommon.

     The main reason for such marriages was the family’s inability to provide the customary dowry to marry off girls and the social pressure to get girls married. The men in the family were forced to find someone, just anyone, even an old man who would marry the girl for little or no dowry.

     But the part that was more tragic was what the women believed. They considered their husbands almost as their god and did everything they demanded. A senior wife asks, “He may be old and ugly. But he is her husband, her god for this life. Then why doesn’t she love him and worship him? ” (p.2)

     Lalithambika Antharjanam, was one of the few women who gained entry into the upper caste, male dominated world of Malayalam literature during this time. She could write touching stories about the injustice the women had to face in these homes because she was one of them.

     The Namputhiris followed Manu’s teaching that a woman does not deserve freedom in the house she is born in or the house she marries into. Lalithambika wrote to draw the attention of the reader to the indescribable way these women suffered with no means to control their destiny.

     This practice was changed by the Namputhiri women who were determined to change it, but they could change it only with the help of the men in the community who realized the injustice done to the women. Lalithambika credits her husband for his support and encouragement to express her beliefs fearlessly. Fortunately, twas a time when Kerala was very much involved in movements to change many such social practices. The famous Temple Entry Proclamation by the Maharaja of Travancore, (one of the three geographic units that formed Kerala) Sri Chithirathirunal, was a revolutionary change brought about during this period (allowing low caste people to enter temples to worship.) After India gained independence, laws were passed to prevent many such discriminatory practices.

Achamma Chandersekaran

Blog: http://achammachander.blogspot.com/
Website: http://www.achammachander.com/
India Edition: www.rainbowbookpublishers@gmail.com

Kindle Edition on Amazon.com

My book Daughters of Kerala

      Carole Hayes, my sophomore year English professor, compared the main characters in four stories to Emma in "Madam Bovary"-- "The Lullaby of Dreams,""Rosemary," "A Rest House for Travellers" and "Ghare Baire." The women in these stories live the dull realities of everyday life and no longer in love with their husbands, are looking elsewhere for affection and romance.

       In "Lullaby of Dreams" the lead character, a woman doctor, a business man’s wife and mother of a child, is infatuated with a young college student who is a family friend and dreams of him day and night. One day she tells him that she loves him more than she loves her husband, child and mother. But he says he is sad about their love because it is not free. He leaves the house saying, “If I stay here, snakes will entwine my feet.” That night while she embraced her husband trying to imagine that she was in the arms of her friend,the young man was sleepless and crying into the pillow.

       Rosemary falls for the neighbor, Thampuran, a member of the royal family. He speaks in a sing-song fashion about plants and flowers talking in their own language and how we can hear them if we listen. The day he dies Rosemary thinks, “Today, nature will wear all its ornaments to say farewell to Thampuran.” While she is paying respect to his body she can hear thousands of harmoniously blended sounds coming from somewhere. As she is getting into the jeep to go back, suddenly raindrops fall on the windshield. That makes her think “nature has cooperated fully in Thampuran’s sendoff … She feels like a lover who has realized her love.”

       Malathy in ‘A Rest House for Travellers” feels that she is just her husband’s “housekeeper, nothing more, except for social occasions… when she is an adornment.” Her husband has “more important work” and no time to spend with her. That is the main reason for her to fall in love with Santosh, another guest at the Rest House who pays a great deal of attention to her. But Malathy decides to stay in the marriage for her own reasons. Finally, the husband learns a valuable lesson from his latest research with black monkeys: “To the male monkey nothing is more important than his mate,” he tells Malathy and hopes it is not too late to make up for the past neglect. However, “the sense of guilt and embarrassment in his voice was not sufficient to melt the frost of her detachment.”

       The housewife in "Ghare Baire" (98) has sex with a married man who is a family friend. The double standard of the man comes through loud and clear when he responds, “I’ll kill her,” to the question, “Can you imagine your wife Usha sitting with another man like this?” His image in the mirror was not smiling. May be such things always happened, though no one dared to write about them. But these are stories written in the 80’s and 90’s and writers were no longer reluctant to write on such topics.

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My book Daughters of Kerala

Vaikom Murali
Literary Columnist

An extraordinary translation of Malayalam short stories comes out of Achamma Chandersekaran's magical touch of translation. The great literary tradition of Malayalam which is one of the richest of Indian languages, finds its way into world literature through this re-creation of some excellent short stories. They must be considered as a profound expression of women's predicament presented through a feminine perspective. The stories are beautifully translated without losing the perfume of some of the great writers of Malyalam literature.

Carole Hayes
English Professor (Retired)


Thanks to their adept translator, Achamma Coilparampil Chandersekaran, the stories in "Daughters of Kerala" preserve each author's distinctive voice. At the same time, the collection raises universal questions about the lives of girls and women. The book will make a welcome text in a course in world literature, women's studies, or short fiction. "Daughters of Kerala" will also appeal to the individual reader seeking a book as entertaining as it is informative.

______________
M.V. Pillai, M.D.

Achamma Chandersekaran's latest work "Daughters of Kerala" is one part an impressive anthology of Kerala women's whirl into the 21st century and another part an artfully distilled essence of the crème de la crème of prose fiction in contemporary Malayalam literature. Portrayed in twenty five lushly crafted and skillfully translated short stories and centering on the trials and tribulations of women caught on the cross purposes at work within families, this literary feat illustrates the cultural evolution of a populace

Gita Bhatia
(Writer)

"Daughters of Kerala" offers a rare insight into the innermost beings of Kerala women and their relationship with men in a context not easily available in the West. Chosen with an open mind from a vast sea of short stories in Malayalam, each story is a brilliant gem that is meant to be enjoyed and treasured, one at a time. I would highly recommend this book for a program in Women's studies and for some deeply satisfying reading.



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My book Daughters of Kerala

Braj Kachru
Author, Professor, Researcher

The collection provides a touching chronicle of the contexts of women's experiences, frustrations, and struggles in the changing social order of that exciting part of India. The vivid translations open a window for non-Malayalam speakers in India and beyond to yet another regional facet of the world of Indian women...

Shashi Tharoor
Diplomat and Author of many books including, “India: From Midnight to Millennium.”

"Daughters of Kerala" is a marvelous collection of first-rate stories, skillfully translated by Achamma Chandersekaran, which marks a welcome addition to the English-speaking world's appreciation of Malayalam literature.

Lyn Richmond
Translator of Geoffrey Chaucer: "The Parliament of Birds"

To immerse one-self in these stories is to be drawn into a strange magic. Part of the strangeness is the juxtaposition of matter-of-fact modernity with a quality of absolute timelessness, arising in part from ancient Hindu mythology but drawing also on a deep-rooted poetic sensibility still un-self-consciously present in the people described here, especially the lovers. And their poetry makes the book sing. The intensity of feeling in these stories is the deeper, perhaps, because of the quietness of their prevailing tone.

Carla Danzinger
Author

DAUGHTERS OF KERALA: 25 SHORT STORIES BY AWARD-WINNING AUTHORS, translated from Malayalam by Achamma Chandersekaran, provides a fascinating read for anyone interested in the art of the short story, international literature, women's studies, or simply learning more about other cultures. Chandersekaran's anthology takes readers to the southwest region of India, where literacy is high and the tradition of short stories--to which women of Kerala have been important contributors--is at least a century old.

Nearly 400,000 women in Kerala work outside their homes. The situation of working women is dealt with in two stories, Fraction (93) and The Riddles in Life (99). In Fraction the wife takes time off from work because she is sick, but she doesn’t get time off from her kitchen duty. Her husband does not do anything to help her in the kitchen, or help their daughter with her homework. The wife is unable to deal with the stress of combining a career with housework and a daughter who needs help with her homework as her husband doesn’t care to help with any of these even when she is sick. In a moment of rage, she commits suicide.


The working woman in Riddles in Life is a doctor. She divorces her husband who is always away on travel. This story is movingly written about by their daughter who is torn between the parents. She loves her father very much but at the same time, is “unable to cross the boundary of her mother’s love.” Children of divorced parents being pulled in different directions is a common occurrence in Western countries. People in many countries will identify with this story. One noteworthy point about this story is that in the eyes of the daughter, there is no malice in all these decisions. The story is written by a young writer who has received awards from the time she was an undergraduate student, now completing her Ph.D in English Literature. Asha Krishnan received the Rajalakshmi Memorial award for this story.

Next Monday and Thursday you will see short reviews of the book . Please send your comments to Achammachander@gmail.com  Website http://www.achammachander.com/

Now let's look at the stories.

Betty Friedan's Feminine Mystique published in the US in 1963 is given credit for igniting the Women's Liberation movement. The book questioned why women could only be in roles that required them to be dependend on men financially, intellectually and emotionally; it questioned why women had to find identity and meaning in their lives through their husbands and sons. It may seem unbelievable that a woman writer in Kerala questioned the very same notions 15 years before Feminine Mystique. Saraswathyamma wrote Female Intellect in 1948. Her stories were her reaction to the question she asked herself: "Why can't women live free and work along side men as equals?" She was angry at the second class status given to women. But a character in Female Intellect, Vijayalakshmi, explains the situation: "Tradition, circumstances, social customs and nature's secrets have gotten together and the woman's brain has to surrender before all these." (p 28)

You may agree that the situation remains a universal problem even today. A woman who takes time off to start a family finds that her career track is somewhat limited because her brain has to surrender to Nature's secrets, tradition, circumstances and social customs. This familiar theme was written about over 60 years ago, 15 years before Feminine Mystique.

Saraswathyamma wrote about the then existing social life from a point of view of women. Though that view point came in conflict with the status quo, this conflict became the hallmark of her stories and set them apart. Sadly, she was not recognized as a writer with new ideas until the 90's when feminism became a recognized topic --20 years after her death and over 40 years after she wrote Female Intellect. You may know how these things are, if you write about controversial topics you just don't get published, perhaps even more so if you are a woman.

More on Thursday.

I had given two reasons why I decided to translate stories from Malayalam to English--1)By taking world literature courses I had realized that we can learn a great deal about another culture by reading their literature and 2) The enjoyable experience I had in translating for the UNESCO. There was a third reason, may be the most important reason. In 1985 I was asked to present a paper on "Women's Contribution to Malayalam Literature" at the Second World Malayalam Conference held in Washington, DC "because there is no one else to do it." Preparing that paper was the first opportunity I had to read a good amount of Malayalam literature seriously. That experience made me realize for the first time, the beauty of the language and how much one might learn about the culture and life in Kerala through the varied themes the authors presented.

"Daughters of Kerala" is my first solo translation project. In my inexperienced way, I had decided that the main criterion for selecting stories would be that the book would include atories about all groups of people in Kerala and the book IS all inclusive.

Marie Varghese in her review of the book said, "One of the great strengths of the anyhology comes from the variety of voices that are featured in these stories. These stories represent the experiences of women from a variety of economic backgrounds." All marital status-married, divorced, unmarried-and the three main religious groups--Hindus, Muslims and Christians--are also represented. This may be one reason why everyone who reads the book will identify with one story or other. The Dean of Santa Monica College in California expressed that point saying, "We start to read the book to transport ourselves to another place , yet come to find ourselves in these stories."

The stories selected for the book justify translation not only for the skills of their authors, but also for the fact that many of them speak to social issues that remain relevant even today.

I will start with the stories next Monday and plan to post them on Mondays and Thursdays.

I can say I posted on Thursday. It is 11:59 PM