Influence Of English On Indian Women Writers

This book reveals English as culture, politics, lifestyle and social change in the context of Indian women. English as a symbol of modernity in India was first accessed by men, giving them a new image of masculinity while Indian languages were ‘feminized’—seen as meant for women. Among upper-caste women, English was a vehicle for social reform and for lessening seclusion, invisibility and economic dependence. For the so-called lower castes, the language was aspirational, indicating emancipation and empowerment possibilities, and threatening upper-caste dominance. English formed its own language of gender and made women’s voices stronger in regional languages, which can be seen in the flowering of women’s articles, fiction, biography and letters. This book records the different ways in which women responded to the coming of English into their lives.

Contributed articles presented at a seminar hosted by Andhra University on 20th century women authors from India.

About the book: The book Indian Women Novelists in English: Art and Vision is a volume of twenty five research articles on contemporary Indian women novelists and their works ranging from Anita Desai, Shashi Deshpande, Manju Kapur, Shobhaa De, Meena Alexander, Githa Hariharan, Arundhati Roy to the younger generation of novelists Anita Nair, Kiran Desai and Jhumpa Lahiri along with two less explored novelists Rita Garg and Nayeema Mahjoor. Three regional writers- Sarah Joseph, Qurratulain Hyder and Mahasweta Devi are also part of this volume, though their write-ups are in regional languages, yet their translated works in English have earned wide popularity. The volume with its diversity of topics will instill knowledge into the critical minds and open many unopened doors from where many unexplored regions of knowledge will be revisited. About the Editor: Dipak Giri- M.A. (Double), B.Ed. - is a Ph. D. Research Scholar in Raiganj University, Raiganj, Uttar Dinajpur (W.B.). He is working as an Assistant Teacher in Katamari High School (H.S.), Cooch Behar, West Bengal. He is an Academic Counsellor in Netaji Subhas Open University, Cooch Behar College Study Centre, Cooch Behar, West Bengal. He was formerly Part-Time Lecturer in Cooch Behar College, Vivekananda College and Thakur Panchanan Mahila Mahavidyalaya, West Bengal and worked as a Guest Lecturer in Dewanhat College, West Bengal. He has the credit of qualifying U.G.C.-N.E.T. two times. He has attended seminars on national and state levels sponsored by U.G.C. Along with this book on Indian women novelists in English, he has also edited four books: Indian English Drama: Themes and Techniques, Indian English Novel: Styles and Motives, Postcolonial English Literature: Theory and Practice and New Woman in Indian Literature: From Covert to Overt. He is a well-known academician and has published many scholarly research articles in books and journals of both national and international repute. His area of studies includes Post-Colonial Literature, Indian Writing in English, Dalit Literature, Feminism and Gender Studies.

The result of extensive archival recovery work, Ellen Brinks's study fills a significant gap in our understanding of women's literary history of the South Asian subcontinent under colonialism and of Indian women's contributions and responses to developing cultural and political nationalism. As Brinks shows, the invisibility of Anglophone Indian women writers cannot be explained simply as a matter of colonial marginalization or as a function of dominant theoretical approaches that reduce Indian women to the status of figures or tropes. The received narrative that British imperialism in India was perpetuated with little cultural contact between the colonizers and the colonized population is complicated by writers such as Toru Dutt, Krupabai Satthianadhan, Pandita Ramabai, Cornelia Sorabji, and Sarojini Naidu. All five women found large audiences for their literary works in India and in Great Britain, and all five were also deeply rooted in and connected to both South Asian and Western cultures. Their works created new zones of cultural contact and exchange that challenge postcolonial theory's tendencies towards abstract notions of the colonized women as passive and of English as a de-facto instrument of cultural domination. Brinks's close readings of these texts suggest new ways of reading a range of issues central to postcolonial studies: the relationship of colonized women to the metropolitan (literary) culture; Indian and English women's separate and joint engagements in reformist and nationalist struggles; the 'translatability' of culture; the articulation strategies and complex negotiations of self-identification of Anglophone Indian women writers; and the significance and place of cultural difference.

Since the late twentieth century, there has been a strategic campaign to recover the impact of Victorian women writers in the field of English literature. However, with the increased understanding of the importance of interdisciplinarity in the twenty-first century, there is a need to extend this campaign beyond literary studies in order to recognise the role of women writers across the nineteenth century, a time that was intrinsically interdisciplinary in approach to scholarly writing and public intellectual engagement.

During The Seventy Years Of Its Effective History Indian Writing In English Crossed Many Miles Stones And Has Come To Be Finally Accepted As A Major Literature Of The World. Having Won Almost Every Important Literary Prize In The Recent Few Years, Iwe Has Become Immensely Popular With The Common International Readers And Critics Alike. If Its Being Prescribed For Study In Universities Across The World Is Any Indication, The Place Of Iwe In The Canon Is Secure Forever.This Anthology Of Critical Articles Attempts To Evaluate Some Of The Major Indian Poets And Novelists And Their Influential Works From Refreshingly New Perspectives Historical, Socio-Economic, Existential, Mythological, Philosophical-Religious And Environmental.The Writers Studied Here Include Anand, Narayan, Raja Rao, Malgonkar, Bhattacharya, Joshi, Desai, Markandaya, Sahgal, Ezekiel And Ramanujan. An Interesting Addition To This Volume Are A Couple Of Articles On The Diaspora Writers Such Rohinton Mistry And The South African Indian Poets And Novelists.It Is Hoped That This Book Will Prove Itself Highly Useful To All Who Are Seriously Interested In Indian Writing In English.

During The Last Few Centuries Women Writers Have Considerably Widened And Deepened The Areas Of Human Experience With Their Sharp, Feminine Perception Of Life Successfully Transmuted Into Verbal Artifact. The World Body Of Literature In English Would Have Been Much Poorer Today But For The Contribution Of Women Writers. The New Series Studies In Women Writers In English Is A Grateful Acknowledgment Of That Contribution And Public Recognition Of Their Voice.The Twenty-Three Essays Included In This Fourth Volume Of The Series Cover A Wide Spectrum Of Women Writers Across Space And Time. The Women Writers Discussed In This Volume Include Five From Britain: Mary Shelley, Charlotte Brontë, George Eliot, Doris Lessing, And Of Course Virginia Woolf, The Twentieth Century Stalwart Of British Novel, Who Has Left Her Indelible Mark On The Art Of Fiction As Well As On Women Writers And Feminist Thinkers Of The Subsequent Decades. We Also Get A Glimpse Of The Entire Corpus Of Writers Engaged With The Feminist Theatre Of America Today, In Addition To Two African-American Talents, I.E. Toni Morrison, The Nobel Laureate For Literature In 1993, And Alice Walker, The Eminent Black American Woman Writer, And A Host Of Contemporary Indian Writers, Particularly With Reference To Their Recent Work, Including Shashi Deshpande, Anita Desai, Shobhaa De, Manju Kapur, Nayantara Sahgal, As Well As Two Émigré Indian Writers Bharati Mukherjee And Jhumpa Lahiri.Since Most Of The Authors Discussed In These Articles Are Prescribed In The English Syllabus In The Universities Of India, Both The Teachers And The Students Will Find Them Extremely Useful, And The General Readers Who Are Interested In Literature In English And/Or Women Writers Will Also Find Them Intellectually Stimulating.