Chapter 3 The Madwoman in the Attic - Shodhganga

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current frustration and agelong remediesn(xi). Thus, Sarabhai's play has
only spirituality to offer as a remedy for frustrations in the life of a woman.
Anuradha's brother, Darshan's painting of the Himalayas becomes the
symbol of escape for :her. ". . . the opposing pulls of tradition and revolt,
the paralysis that makes the impulse to move forward so futile a gesture,
are the soul of the plajr" (Iyengar, Indian Writing in English 200).

Ezekiel's "Marriage Poem" is an effective treatment of "the
marriage-at-the-menopause" (Blackwell 268) stage. There is no love or
understanding between Mala and Naresh. For all her submissiveness, Mala
does try occasionall~rto assert herself. She asks Mrs. Lall regarding
Naresh's forgetting to post her letter, "Why shouldn't he post them for me?
I do lots of things f o r him" (TP 64). She does not hesitate to voice her
opinions. She asks Kiaresh "to be fair" (TP 70) to her. She is voicing a
strong feeling experienced by women in general; the feeling that they are
not fairly treated by men. The canons of fairness are not exercised by men
vis-a-vis women.

However, Mala only succeeds m alienating Naresh by clinging to him
possessively. She feels that she can secure him to her only through nagging.
She does not realize that a relationship can remain healthy only if it is given
space to breathe and grow, and both the partners enjoy autonomy.

It should be noted that Mala uses her submissnveness and
dependence to manipulate Naresh. She gets what she wants This shows
that even a woman who appears to be the traditional doormat type, may be

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the shrewder, the more successful partner in a marriage. Women try to
exercise control by allowing themselves to be dependent and taken care of,
and by taking care of others. "Both versions of the traditional female role
suggest the devious ways an oppressed group may find to make an
impression on the w o r l d (Spacks 103). Such stratagems are employed to
survive in a patriarc:hal society, which makes direct tactics of survival
impossible. Women, like Mala, often get what they want through devious
means, but they do not realize that it is at the expense of the relationship.

In "The Doldri~mmers",Currimbhoy extracts "moving moments of
emotion and truth from his theme and his out-of-social-pale characters"
(Raha n.pag.). Rita is bound by her love for Tony. But there are times when
she demands to be treated as a person in her own right. When she learns
that Tony has taken a watch from Liza as a present, she says, "\Yhy did you
do it! Isn't my love enough for you? I've given you all of it. Why shouldn't
I expect all from you. Woman's no different from a manL' ( D D 0 20).
Through these word:; of protest and protestation, she vindicates the case
that a meaningful man-woman relationship can be built only on the solid
foundations of fairness and equality. Later, when Liza sends a golden
watch strap, she takes a firm stand for once, "you accept that present, Tony
and we're through ( D D 0 24). However, Rita is not able to carry on the
conflict and quickly succumbs. She accepts Tony's friend, Joe's advice that
she sell her body to buy presents for Tony. Such yielding happens in the
case of many a woman. "Halfway between revolt and slavery, she resigns

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herself reluctantly to masculine authority" (Beauvoir, The Second Sex 623).
This is because many women do not have confidence in themselves. There
seems to be safety and security in the conventional role. So rather
unwillingly, they pull back the foot they have gingerly put forward.

Finally Rita is disillusioned with Tony too and realizes that "we each

live only for ourselves . . ." ( D D 0 51). Such awareness is the outcome of

mental growth, which occurs as a result of conflict. Later when Tony
returns with his friend, leashed like a dog, and calls him Tony, Rita reaches
breaking point. She runs to the sea to drown herself. Tony runs after her.
However, he does not know how to swim and it is Rita who saves him.

"Like a child bawling out for his mother he cries out to Rita for help" (DD0

74 - 75). Their positions are temporarily reversed.

The play ends w ~ t hRita more confident of herself, partly due to the
fact that she has regained Tony and overcome Liza's hostility, and partly
due to the fact that she is pregnant with Joe's child, a symbol of hope. The
role of the mother is seen by most women as the most important in the life
of the adult female. It is a major source of satisfaction and self-esteem.
Perhaps Rita has taken the first step towards self-independence, despite the
chequered course of her choices and actions.

In "The Dumb Dancer" (Currimbhoy), the women characters, Prema
and Shakuntala, dominate the action of the play. Prema is the medical
superintendent in the mental asylum where the deranged Kathakali
dancer, Bhima, is brought for treatment. The very fact that she works,

creates conflict between her and society. ~urrimbhoy's clescription
indicates the stress she is under:

She is the only woman amongst the doctors, and though her
training and discipline as a psychiatrist enables her to discuss
matters objectively, she carries the self-consciousness of her
sex. Besides it must be remembered that in a society where
career-women are comparatively few, those that take up a
profession tend to champion it all the more. Prema, balancing
as she does the various divergent forces in her environment
and personality, is thus a complex and somewhat
unpredictable creature. (DD0 88)
Dr. Dilip wishes to marry her, but he too seems to resent the fact that
she works, "You laugh like a woman. What are you doing in
uniform?"(DDO 89). Prema refuses his proposal of marriage and the
suggestion that she work in the psychiatry ward of his hospital. She says, "1
would want things my own way"(DD0 90). Bhima's guru also finds it
difficult to accept a working woman. Prema says, "I remember the old
Guru at our first meeting thought it quite . . . improper that a woman
should be working a t a man's j o b (DD0 137). Prema struggles against
such reactions in her :searchfor independence.
She is successful in her conflict with society for she does not give in.
But she loses the battle within herself. She develops a fatal attraction for
Bhima. As Iyengar states in "The Dramatic Art of Asif Currimbhoy", she

146

"begins to take more than a strictly professional interest in him and
engineers with her best clinical precision a gruesome tragedy" (249). Her
plan is to shock him out of the delusion that he is Bhima by letting him
hold human entrails. She murders Shakuntala for this purpose. She then
slips into Bhima's world-the world of the insane. Currimbhoy, perhaps,
traces in Prema the repercussions of the conflict faced by women. A
woman has to suffer great mental strain in such a conflict. Lack of support
adds to the strain. This leads to psychological problems, such as insanity,
as evidenced above. However, he also condemns the woman by tracing
Prema's downfall to her unrepressed sexuality.

"'Goa' presents the last stages of a dying colonialism through
symbolic characters, {thatis, characters who are not only individuals but
who also embody or reflect historical and social forces" (Nazareth 13-14).
The women characters control the action. Senhora Miranda uses her
sensuality to enslave both Alphonso and Krishna. "She embodies the
personal struggle as well as the spiritual force with which Currimbhoy
frequently endows his women characters" (Meserve 423). In Miranda, we
see the conflict faced by a woman as well as the political conflict of a
colony. However, the emphasis is on her struggle as a woman. Miranda is a
strong woman rendered helpless and vulnerable by circumstances. She is
unable to forget the horror of her rape. This makes her hate coloured
people and also makes her unable to love her daughter, Rose, the result of
the rape. She is a victim of the man-woman conflict of the violent type-

147

namely rape. That event marks the beginning of her suffering. Though she
struggles valiantly to overcome this blight upon her life, she fails. 111 spite
of her best efforts, she is not able to win over either Alphonso or Krishna,
whom she sees as means of escape from her present way of life. One of the
consequences of her failure, however, is a closer bond of attachment with
her daughter, Rose.

Rose is unable to rise in conflict against her domineering mother. She
is pitted against her mother and the possessive lovers, Krishna and
Alphonso. Her subjugation is complete when Krishna rapes her with the
assistance of her mother. Earlier deaf, she also blindfolds herself. But one
day when Krishna comes to see her, she kills him. This positive act is her
only attempt at conflict. She wants to see again and asks her mother to take
the blindfold off. She now wishes "to live and not merely exist" (GHO 80).

The difference between merely existing and living is perhaps the
difference between the earlier image and the new evolving image of the
Indian woman. One positive act of self-assertion can do wonders for the
female psyche, as seen in the case of Rose. It gives self-confidence, self-
respect and self-motivation.Unfortunately, most women have t:obe pushed
into a corner or challenged, before they make a bid for living life on their
own terms. "The master-slave relation . . . represents the maximal
disequilibrium of self-consciousness,and it is from this point that the long
peregrination of consciousness towards an adequate concept of itself will
begin" (Dews 54). This is true in the case of both Rose and liita. Having

148

endured the complete humiliation of surrender of self, they are seen at the
end of the plays with a chance of living more fulfilling lives.

In Dina Mehta's plays, women are aided in their struggles by men.
Even Pramila ("The Myth-Makers"), the submissive, dependent, over-the -
hill actress, does attempt to rise in conflict. She is inspired to do so by two
reasons-her friend and admirer, Anand's support, and her unfaithful,
lover, Joglekar's unscrupulous behaviour. Anand knows Joglekar's real
nature and constantly tries to persuade Pramila to leave Joglekar and come
away with him, but she is apprehensive about forsaking the old, even
though unpleasant, for the new. He says:

I had thought to liberate you of dead customs, of allegiances
as old as Manu, of chains forged by your own hands, of myths
that rest beyond the reach of reason. . . . But I find I had just
played at waving the wand, for even the gods cannot help
those who are not ready to help themselves. (n.pag.)
Anand warns her that Joglekar is responsible for the murder of the South
Indian journalist, Krishnamurthy. He is trying to buy Anand's silence, for
Anand is the only eye witness.
Pramila is hesitant and unsure of herself in spite of all tlds. She feels
a sense of courage ordy when Anand is with her. "When I am with you, 1
would like to touch life again, somewhere, God knows. But it is too late to
recapture the world -or my identity. I'm too o l d (n.pag.). However, at
the end of the play, she decides that she has had enough. Joglekar suggests

that she sleep with Anand, who loves her, in order to ensure his silence.
She asks Joglekar to get out. When he reminds her that he owns the flat, she
prepares to leave. She calls her maid, Mukti and says that "her time of
servitude is over" (n.pag.). She hopes that her "rusty wheel will twitch
back to life, moving clockwise again" (n.pag.). But the revolt dies down.
She realizes that she is too old to make a fresh start:

Only a rnoment ago 1 felt on the verge of brave, reckless
actions. The unknown beckoned, and I felt I could run up the
fierce slolpes, straight into the sun. (sits do7un) But it: takes more
than what I have left-to climb mountains. It is not for one
who pants and gasps at every step, with straining lungs and
aching muscles. I know too late that courage needs to be
exercised, faith needs to be exercised, not only flabby muscles.
Peaks are not for my habitation-I've had to scamper down
before I began the climb, retrace my feet back to this
remembered stool. (n.pag.)
Pramila compares her brief uprising to the flaring of a match. When
the play ends, she is resigned to her life without action, without meaning,
in a carapace of the past.
Vishakha becomes the victim of priapic power but holds her own in
Karnad's The Fire and the Rain. The background of the play is a seven-year
long fire sacrifice conducted to bring rain. Vishakha, the wife of the Chief
Priest of the sacrifice, Paravasu, is approached by Yavakri, Paravasu's

150

cousin, after his penance of ten years. He says his first recollections on
getting enlightenment, were the moments of bidding good bye to her and
the smell of her body. Vishakha, who has led a life of deprivation, a life
bereft of love and speech, since her husband, Paravasu took up the charge
of Chief Priest of the fire sacrifice, succumbs to his advances. L.ater, when
her father-in-law, Rail~hya,creates a demon to kill Yavakri, she rushes to
warn him. He then reveals that he had used her to provoke Raibhya.
Yavakri had kept ready a pot of sacred water to kill the demon. "Vishakha,
shocked by the ruthless manner in which her yearning for love has been
exploited, throws off the consecrated water Yavakri had kept to protect
himself, and Yavakri is killed at the door of his own hermitage" (Maya 70).
Vishakha, thus, has her revenge.

Her surrender to Yavakri is a yielding to the demands of the body,
rather than a result of love. The drought of the land had entered her soul
and she had turned to Yavakri for the water of affection. Her courage can
be seen in her confession to her husband. She is ready to accept the
punishment he deems fit. She admits her suppressed sexual urges. She has
had to face her father-in-law's "curdled lust" (33). She says boldly, "At
least Yavakri was warm, gentle. For a few minutes, he made me forget the
wizened body, the scratchy claws, and the blood, cold as ice" (33). Towards
the end of the play, F'aravasu sacrifices himself in the blaze of the sacrificial
pavilion. The readers are left in the dark as to Vishakha's future life.
However, they can imagine her as a survivor battling against the odds of life.

Nittilai, in the same play, brings out the goodness in Arvasu. It is
due to her influence that he releases the tormented soul of the Brahma
Rakshas created by Raibhya to kill Yavakri. Nittilai "represents the force
that drives through life, asks meaningful questions about life. She knows
no hypocrisy" (Nirmala 27). But like Vishakha, Nittilai, too has to bow
before the wishes of a patriarchal society. Both of them are married against
their wishes. This leads to the ruin in their lives. "Vishakha and Nittilai
represent modem married women craving for freedom. They stand for the
female principle desiring freedom to live with men of their choice"
(Rajendran 70).

So also, the Queen in Karnad's "Bali: The Sacrifice", espouses her
belief till the very end. The King had converted to Jainism, her creed, at
their marriage. However, his mother continues to remain a worshipper of
Kali. One night, the Queen is entranced by a song coming frorn a deserted
temple. The singer turns out to be a mahout, with a hump on his back and
an ugly face. The Queen spends the night with him and they are discovered
by the King. To hide his wife's infidelity, he invents a nightmare as the
reason for his wandering about at night. His mother at once wants to
sacrifice a hundred fowls to Kali to ward off the evil portents of the
ominous dream. Even after the mother realizes the truth, she insists on the
sacrificeto appease the Gods for the Queen's act of transgression. A conflict
arises between the Queen and the King's mother. As a compromise, a cock
of dough is made a substitute for the sacrificial fowls. But the Queen

refuses to participate in the symbolic sacrifice.She identifies with the cock
of dough. In a rare act of honesty, she declares that she will not disown the
Mahout or what transpired between them. She promises not to betray the
King in future. She tells the King that the intention to violence is as bad as
the violence itself. So the symbolic sacrifice is as cruel as a real sacrifice. It
is, in effect, her execution. Rather than live the travesty of a life with the
King, she impales herself on his sword. "Bali: The Sacrifice" is " a riveting
play on violence and non-violence, on tolerance and intolerance, on guilt
and culpability, on desire and freedom" (Deshpande 22). The Queen tries
to stand for her beliefs, and rather than accept defeat, kills herself.

The sexual exploitation of women through advertisments is one of the
issues in Dattani's "Bravely Fought the Queen". Jiten and his brother Nitin
run an advertising agency which is preparing to launch a new range of
women's nightwear. But surveys reveal that the visual advertisement made
by them is not approved of by women. In the video commercial, the woman
model sees her lover coming, quickly changes into the new nightwear, lets
her hair loose, pirouettes and lies down on the bed. Sridhar, their manager,
had distributed questionnaires to women from all levels of society and all of
them had found the advertisement offensive. He reads out some of the
responses: "There was nothing personal or realistic about it. (Keads another.)
It was tasteless and degrading. Despite its westernised treatment, it upholds
the silliest of all Indian notions that a woman exists to please man etc., etc."
(CP 279). These reactions serve to indicate the general awakening of Indian

153
women about their exploitation as sexual objects. Advertisements regularly

project images of the female torso: ". . . her torso becomes a corporate text"

(Barr 193). The creators of such an advertisement expect that most female
viewers will wish to become the svelte woman projected, and to transform
themselves into a male fantasy. They want the women to be "like so many
Alices trying to assume the right size to fit a male wonderland (Barr 193).

Dattani's "characters struggle for some kind of freedom and
happiness under the weight of tradition, cultural constructions of gender,
and repressed desire" (Mee 319). This is true of the sisters, Do:llyand Alka
married to the brothers, Jiten and Nitin- Alka drinks, and Dolly fantasizes
about a Kanhayia who is perhaps her picture of an ideal man. Baa, their
mother-in-law, had protested against the ill-treatment of her husband by
turning her sons against their father. She forces Nitin to say that he hates
his father and derives pleasure from this (CP 302). Dolly describes a Naina
Devi who is known as the queen of "thumris" which are love songs sung
only by "tawaifs" in :her day. In spite of being married into royalty, Naina
Devi wanted to sing. Her husband supported her. Thus, she was able to
indulge in her desire. This leads to a talk on the Rani of Jhansi who is
described in a Hindi poem as a "manly queen" (CP 296)-a queen full of
manly valour. This is the ideal in the minds of Dolly and Alka. But the
sisters do nothing to change their lives.

Alka had been tricked by her brother into marrying Nitin, a
homosexual. But she puts up with him and suffers silently all the insults he

154
heaps upon her. The only time she allows herself to be free is when she
spontaneously dances in the rain. But then her husband and brother-in-law
get back; she twists her ankle and becomes self-conscious and ernbarrassed.

Dolly protests only when Jiten says that he had been provoked into
hitting her during her pregnancy by his mother. She doesn't allow him to
escape from the guilt that she had, as a result, given birth to a retarded
daughter-"No! Oh no! I will not let you get away so easily! They were
your hands hurting me! Your feet kicking me !" (CP 312). The characters in
this play are as twisted as the dwarfed bonsai tree which is a motif in the
play. They struggle against the bonds that restrict them, but in vain.

A beggar woman is used as another motif in the play. Finally, Jiten
runs over her in his car and kills her. The beggar woman stands for truth or
reality that is unpalatable, and therefore quickly brushed aside. In the case
of Jiten, it is the knowledge of his ill-treatment of his wife and his guilt in
having been responsible for the birth of their mentally retarded daughter.
In an email interview with the researcher, Dattani remarks that, in the case
of the two sisters, "she represents poverty and homelessness. Something
that the two sisters share with her in spite of being inside the home rather
than outside" (Appendix 3).

Most wives choose indirect methods of protest, often garnering their
chidrens' help. Aruna, Ramnik's wife, in "Final Solutions" is aware of her
husband's feeling that he is superior to her in intellect and reason. He looks
down upon her and scorns her opinions. She protests by persuading their

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daughter, Smita, to adopt her way of life. Smita, who understands her
father's covert moves to target her mother, foils his plans, by siding with
her mother, even though she disagrees with her on some matters.

Sonal and Preeti, the wife and daughter-in-law of Hasmukh Mehta,
in Dattani's "Where There's a Will", do not indulge in any open
confrontation. Sonal resents the dominating nature of her husband and
says, "He thinks he is king of all he surveys! And we are his subjects" (CP
472). She cannot challenge his authority openly. So she supports her son,
Ajit, in his rebellion against his father.

Preeti, Hasmukh's daughter-in-law and Ajit's wife in the play, is
clever and shrewd. Hasmukh describes her as "charming, graceful and sly
as a snake" (CP 456). He knows that she married Ajit for the money he will
inherit. But keethi behaves in an obsequious manner to her father-in-law.
As she explains later: "I gave in, I simply listened to him and didn't
'protest' like you! I knew he didn't have long to live. I thought why not
humour him for a few days? After he's gone, we can have all the freedom

to do what we want, and also all the money" (CP 501 - 502). Her scheming

nature is revealed when it is discovered that she had replaced. Hasmukh's
blood pressure pills with her vitamin pills. She had then let nature take its
course. In this devi0u.sway, she overthrows the patriarchal authority of her
father-in-law. But after his death, she realizes that he continues to control
the family from the grave through his will.