The pull is a-strong with these women…
The ruse to lure a reader into reading a classic is the agenda which the writer sets, and no time is as powerful and significant as that of a woman, who rises like a Phoenix from the ashes of patriarchy, orthodox notions, poverty, shame, unexpected health problems, mental illness, familial pressure, the audacity of male moths, etc. The power of the uterus gets going a plot that would be rancid otherwise. The assertion of timid and fearful transits into Kali Shakti leaves a reader like me in a stupendous aura, wanting a bounteous amount of these women.
Stereotypes are walking barefoot but with so many writers and female-centric movements, more and more women-centric literature with upliftment and empowerment are gracing the bookshelves. What did you last read which smashes patriarchy and is written by a woman?
In Malayalam there is a character named kanchanamala, she is a lady and her love story is made into a movie named "Ennu Ninte Moideen". This movie has won several awards and this is a real story. This lady character is still alive In Calicut, Kerala. She radiates energy and the true nature of a living classic. "Pathummayude Aadu" by Vaikom Muhammed Basheer has many renowned female literary protagonists whose lives are more than just paper on words and as a reader, one tries to look at regional masterpieces where women shine like all the gold on the neck they hold.
Baba Padmanji’s Yamuna Paryatan, which used an unornamented style of storytelling to vouchsafe about the plight of widows.
Premchand's Sewasadan (The Abode of Service), published in 1916, lifted the veil of fantasy to accentuating the enthrall of being a woman in today's civilization. Issues like child marriage and dowry were contested and debated. This makes us think that whether good morals and progress of a society can be predicted on the basis of the treatment the society provides to its Jan-ni, women. Rokeya Hossein wrote a satire called Sultana’s Dream, which shows an extraordinary cloverleafing between men and women. The characters are venerable and deemed to persist in one's minds, making us aware of the power of a novel to transform one's thinking by taking us on a ride to futuristic domains of the unthinkable. Where women rule.
The women in the works of Mirabai, Krishna Sobti, Amrita Pritam didn't conform to the moral strictures and empathy paved the way for confirmation. I get inspired by such a barge of women in literature.
The image of women in fiction has undergone a drastic change from classics on the topic of whether Madonna could be equated to a whore or motherhood to mentally ill women and their outcries which has now seen a bit or more of everything cogitable. The strength to write and to live these lives are scarcely plausible to some, to some it's relatable and to some, it offers evidence of societal shifts which girls like me dream of.
Thackeray's Vanity Fair is noted for the vigor, solidity of its female roles. Margaret Attwood's Handmaid's Tale is the latest disruptor of the various centuries-long women's rights issues. It's so dark. I think my coffee felt shy. I have watched the show on Prime and I enjoyed it as much as the books.
Christina Rossetti, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Harriet Martineau, and in the USA - Louisa May Alcott, Emily Dickenson, and countless others through their impregnability shaped women's classics popularity. The women which Toni Morrison wrote about were too strong and imperishable. Like 20% alcohol content in a double-dipped bourbon tank.
There are only two or three human stories, and they go on repeating themselves as fiercely as if they had never happened before, said Willa Cather, and I couldn't agree more. Till we achieve total equality, equanimity, and representation, not only in development or culture but in the hearts and minds as well, these women will continue to overthrow egoistic, egocentric, self-absorbed, and self-involved patriarchal resigns.
My tryst with women was destined to inspire my lifelong crusade of funding my dreams through rich, emotive, and motivational lives started with- Egyptian Queens like Nefertiti and Cleopatra. Then the seeding married my mid-life crisis with Susan Sontag. Women whom we don't know much of, I feel an attraction to read more on them. Katherine Ann Porter is a recent addition to this list of women in Lit I adore, love, and look up to.
Shakespeare gave us too many strong women to love and admire. Lady Macbeth, Miranda from Tempest, two to tango to the top of the cream.
I and other women, from compounded corners that we reside in, come to the conclusion of being moved by these supercalifragilisticexpialidocious women writers, the strong proclivity, a sense of belonging, the urge to excel, and the mellowness, geniality which some of their dreams provide with is the future’s patchwork reality. The ginormous relief and happiness. And through various feministic waves in the literary world, we keep on finding gems of bosoms, filling us. Begetting us. Befitting us.
Readers loved Jane Eyre so much that one can't really separate fiction from nonfiction. For me, reading Eyre was everything. Including re-reading her.
Smuggling Anne Frank's Dairy as she smuggled herself every day in and out of her closeted life through her commendable strength left me wiser and with a hunger for knowing more about such women and girls. There are so many. Sometimes, I feel that knowing them all would be unfair, somewhere I also need to pave a way for a classical sort of living and loving. The classics I read as a child and now have made me the woman I am now. Rose and Ida Arnold from Brighton Rocks, Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby, Sarah from End of an Affair, these women were gritty and not your next door's. The Mast Of The Game taught me resilience. The writings of Katherine Ann Porter, Everyday Sexism by Laura Bates are my recent Western appraisals. Sarah Manguso’s 300 Arguments is my favorite book by a women author who knows all too well. Not at alls, here I come. But everyone knows the quintessential’s, what about the lesser-known wonders? I don't think Autobiography of a woman like no other- Leila Seth’s On Balance, written by Vikram Seth's mother and the first female judge to preside in any High Court of India, counts as a classic. But I believe that nothing can define a classic better than the heartful criteria of coming back to a protagonist/character/story which is timeless and can shake the very foundation of any set criteria.
When Cheryl Strayed Walked a thousand miles from the Mojave Desert to California, Oregon, and Washington State, she became the stuff modern classics are made of. Breathing literature, giving hope and advice to millions. Her books and columns are mothers to many. She is a mother which we never had.
The revolution of strength in any era will be incomplete without the mention of A Room of One's Own. The writers of this generation of the 'awakening' are a reflection of their own eccentric personalities which caused a furor.
Because of the sharpness of our features, I consider Susan Sontag as my doppelganger. Hungry and articulated in a formative approach to give insights in hindsight, she was one of the best. A fierce, unique lady of gold. Sarojini Naidu, another unique soul from the homeland, gives me goosebumps every time I read about her or the various brave women who participated in the Indian freedom struggle. Likewise, Maya Angelou from the West gave me an appetite for more.
Marina Keegan's The Opposite Of Loneliness is intense, simply witty and the backstory is fire on ice! Marina's book was published posthumously, she died too early. But left notes and writings which developed into this soulful book. How one can stay true to oneself was then the anthem of the lonely girl, finding solace in books of and by women which gave her much to be happy about. If words could give birth. They did.
The stalwarts and the Donna's of literature are literally the best things that could happen to the classical movement. From the victim tag to the worst women serial killer- the 'Strong' in the women are growing muscle mass in classic literature, all languages, and in every corner.
What's trending is the rise of the new breed of strong women. These women, reality or fiction are turning tables, heads and creating a 'scene 'like no other.
ARTIST CORNER
Here, in my newsletter, I believe there is space for everyone. It is never going to be a space just for me. So, in the health of this statement, I must tell you if you don’t already know- I talk about an Artist or Creator every time I send out a newsletter. I know for sure that many talented Artists and people who write, draw or sketch, do it not only out of pleasure but also pressure when they decide that their friends and families will keep aside 1% of what they spend on Amazon and such giants and spend on buying a small trinket or painting from them.
Featuring today is Benita. She is a gifted painter and sketch artist. She drew me. I loved it. Nobody has ever drawn me before, so it was really something. And I can't talk about the effort and fine-tuning it must have taken for her to get so much of me, right. Do contact her/DM her if a print or sketch interests you. She deserves your monies.
BUY FROM THE ARTISTS DIRECTLY. HELP THE WORLD BE FREE-ER OF DEBT
I will do a series of 10 newsletters I have discovered every now and then. So look out for that in the next issue of my virtual hug for you. The next one sin not going to bore you with an essay but a Listicle of further possibilities.
10 Articles Which Deserve A Read
This Verve List Of People columns as is because otherwise, I could go on sharing most of the Articles individually anyways
A really cool page and concept for Grief handling- discovered this while browsing myself dead at 7 AM, tears dripping down my frazzled skin
People-pleasing can help us adjust better to new surroundings or make friends more easily
As a child by Vidyan Ravinthiran
Things Not to Say by Amy Collini
How Many Submissions Do Literary Agents Receive?
That’s it for this issue!❤
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LOVE YOUR ENTHUSIASM
Women lit special was indeed well wrtitten. How lovely and witty! Love you for this , Shalini ji