Enigmatic Indian Woman

Woman, in recent times has been assigned a very reasonable place in the framework of society. She is not regarded as a necessary evil to be tolerated anyhow but as the prime factor in man’s worldly as well as spiritual happiness. Man cannot make any progress if there be no woman by his side ready to co-operate with him in all his activities. The present book attempts to depict critically the various types of women as presented by major Indian women novelists. The writers included in the book are Anita Desai, Kamala Markandaya, Shashi Deshpande, Nayantara Sahgal, Mahasweta Devi, Arundhati Roy, Jhumpa Lahiri, Taslima Nasrin, Bharati Mukherjee, Rama Mehta, Kiran Desai, Manju Kapur, Anita Nair, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Shobha De and Sudha Murthy. The writers have depicted both the diversity of women and the diversity within each woman, rather than limiting the lives of women to one ideal. Their writings are significant in making society aware of women’s demands and in providing a medium for self-expression. The book offers a comprehensive analysis of a number of relevant feminist writers whose critiques open a new dimension related to various issues like hybridity, otherness, orientalism, diaspora, multiculturalism, dalitism, gender studies and feminism. It will go a long way in providing the readers with a broad spectrum of perspectives having much relevance today. It will undoubtedly prove valuable to the scholars of English literature.