Chandani Lokuge
Showing all 8 books
Aruni is a troubled young woman who lives in Melbourne with her adopted family, but has never felt at home in Australia. She returns to Sri Lanka, the country of her birth, seeking out the ‘beach people’ who scratch a living from the beautiful coastline. Aruni yearns to know more about her mother, Mala, who grew up on the beach. In the comfort of her hotel, Aruni flirts with Paul, an older, married Australian man, but she is ...
Cornelia Sorabji (1866-1952) pioneers the tradition of Indian-Parsee women’s literature in English. She is also one of the earliest women in India to fictionalize the Indian woman in the English language. Sorabji was a prolific writer, and along with her memoirs, India Calling, her biographies of her parents and of her sister, she published fiction and prose. Love and Life Behind the Purdah, her first published book contains some of her most moving and ...
"Born into a Parsee family in Nasik in the Bombay Presidency in 1866, Cornelia Sorabji’s identity was shaped by three streams of cultural influences—the British, the Indian and the Parsee. Sorabji was India’s first woman barrister. This is her autobiography from early childhood to adulthood. Written with a radically feminist perspective, it traces the author’s self-development, and depicts the status and lifestyle of orthodox Hindu women, to the ...
"Published in 1895, Saguna is the first autobiographical novel in English written by an Indian woman. Through the story of a rebellious adolescent torn between the old world and the new, the author portrays the experience of growing up in a family recently converted to Christianity--the breaking away from traditional Hindu ideologies, the subsequent schizophrenic search for stability. The story is made more poignant by the presence in it of Saguna's mother ...
I go down to the river, unheeding my mother’s disapproval. I dip into the lazily flowing water. Here, at least, nothing has changed. The bath-cloth balloons around my body and I press it down. I loosen my hair and let it spread where it will. I open my hands upwards on the water’s surface, languidly remembering. All, all that is familiar. The promise. The promise of life. As a young woman in Sri Lanka, Manthri marvels at the ...
Ratanbai traces the poignant life story of a Marathi Brahmin girl from early childhood, through to child-marriage and into maturity. As the daughter of a westernized lawyer father and a deeply traditional mother, young Ratanbai is caught in the grips of the east-west encounter within the precincts of her own home. The novel serves as a socio-historic document offering insights into the domestic routine and distinctive familial and religious customs of Marathi ...
Toru Dutt (1856-77) pioneered the Indian Women's English literary tradition. Conversant in four languages-English, French, Bengali, and Sanskrit--Toru was a novelist, poet, essayist, and translator. When she died at the age of twenty one, she left behind an impressive collection of writing. This volume brings together her two novels, a book of poetry, and a selection of her letters. Her writings give voice to the aspirations of a sensitive young woman trying to ...