Growing Up as a Woman Writer

The present volume brings to the reader the works of women writers in India across languages, regions, religions, socioeconomic structures, caste hierarchies and genres. In its wide-ranging presentation of creative writing, it also works across generations. A product of the proceedings of two seminars on women writers orgainised by the Sahitya Akademi, the volume brings together debates on definition of women’s writing and feminism, personal narratives and recollection, poetry and short stories that reflect different hues of life. The insights the writers provide convey the Indian reality with all its immediacy and in this lies the strength of these writings. Writing, as it moves from the oral to the written text, simultaneously represents a sense of freedom, a discovery of the self and reaching out to the other. The critical essays go on to interrogate literary canons, modes of representation, aesthetics, feminist positions and the question of readership. Ranging from the personal to the political, from the lyrical to the hardcore intellectual voice, the volume conveys the vibrancy of the writing of women in India today. Under the cover, we have here, the making of a new literary tradition.