Feminist Perspective in Shashi Deshpande’s ‘That Long Silence’ | Original Article

ABSTRACT:

Shashi Deshpande emerged on the Indian fictional scene in the 1970s. She has nevertheless created a place for herself in the Galaxy of Indian women novelists in English. She possesses deep insight into the female psyche and focuses on the marital relationship. She also seeks to expose the tradition that a woman is trained to play subservient role in the family. She has created ripples in the society of male domination by taking women as women seriously in her novels. She takes us inside the consciousness of her women characters to reveal their fears, plight, dilemmas, contradictions and ambitions. Her novels revel the man-made patriarchal tradition and uneasiness of the modern Indian women in being a part of them. Her young heroines rebel against the traditional way of life and patriarchal values. She has portrayed a realistic picture of the middle class educated women who, although financially independent, are still facing the problems of adjustments between idealism and pragmatism. She excels in her projection of middle class women with turmoils, convulsions, frustrations, endurance and ‘that long silence’ which has been there lot for many centuries. Her novels are mainly based on the lives of women and their problems particularly in the Indian context. For this reason she has been labelled as a ‘feminist’.