Examining Depiction of Women in Tilottoma Misra’s Swarnalata
Date
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Department of English
Abstract
This paper examines the depiction of women in Tilottoma Misra’s Swarnalata in the
light of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s notion of the Subaltern Perspective. The novel
picturizes the condition of women in nineteenth-century Assam through the three
female characters: Swarna, Tora, and Lakhipriya. Through these female characters,
Misra presents the prevalent conventional notions in the then society that had
suppressed females, in the beginning, and as the story grows she eventually releases
that through the agency they were able to debunk the orthodoxical instances.
Therefore, this research paper focuses on three specific questions: how have women
been depicted in the novel? Why does the writer choose to write Swarnalata amidst
the turbulence? And why a character like Gunabhiram has been presented? With the
focus on these three characters, the paper argues that Misra’s politics is to address
that women do not remain in a static position but rather their state of vulnerability
changes when they are provided agency. Furthermore, it is through the agency that
women can obtain a position equivalent to that of the males in society.
Keywords: Swarnalata, Subaltern, Organic intellectuals, Agency, Liberation