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The Ring of Recollection
Transgenerational Haunting in the Novels of Shashi Deshpande
Series: - Cross/Cultures, Volume: 126
Author:
In The Ring of Recollection, Nancy Batty challenges the critical orthodoxy that Shashi Deshpandeâs fiction is transparently realistic and narrowly focused on domestic and womenâs issues. This study shifts attention towards the labyrinthine structure and modernist style of most of Deshpandeâs writing. Features hitherto viewed as deviations from her realism, or even as flaws, are re-situated in the light of a gothic poetics that works to uncover a structural trope of transgenerational secrecy, beginning with Deshpandeâs early detective fiction and extending to her most recent work.
Linking a fourth-century Sanskrit play by Kalidasa (Shakuntala) and the psychoanalytic theories of Nicolas Abraham and Maria Torok, Batty offers in-depth reinterpretations of five of Deshpandeâs major novels, published over a period of twenty years (1980â2000): The Dark Holds No Terrors; That Long Silence; The Binding Vine; A Matter of Time; and Small Remedies. These novels have established Deshpandeâs critical reputation as a âwomanâsâ writer whose major concern is to break the âlong silenceâ of Indian women. Batty shifts the ground of analysis by establishing that Deshpandeâs fictional world encompasses more than just female characters, and that the trope of silence extends not only to her male characters but also to communities, in a society where silence about shameful past events can control the destinies of entire families. Thus we see in her novels characters whose lives are disturbed, haunted, and sometimes even controlled not just by traumatic events but also by transgenerational family secrets to which they often do not have access. Moreover, the breaking of silence â the revelatory opening of family crypts â can have devastating consequences. Restoration of memory may have the power to reorganize the past and change the future, but it rarely possesses the magic required to reunite lovers or to restore wholeness to shattered lives.
The Ring of Recollection offers a major reappraisal of one of Indiaâs most prolific and respected contemporary writers.
Linking a fourth-century Sanskrit play by Kalidasa (Shakuntala) and the psychoanalytic theories of Nicolas Abraham and Maria Torok, Batty offers in-depth reinterpretations of five of Deshpandeâs major novels, published over a period of twenty years (1980â2000): The Dark Holds No Terrors; That Long Silence; The Binding Vine; A Matter of Time; and Small Remedies. These novels have established Deshpandeâs critical reputation as a âwomanâsâ writer whose major concern is to break the âlong silenceâ of Indian women. Batty shifts the ground of analysis by establishing that Deshpandeâs fictional world encompasses more than just female characters, and that the trope of silence extends not only to her male characters but also to communities, in a society where silence about shameful past events can control the destinies of entire families. Thus we see in her novels characters whose lives are disturbed, haunted, and sometimes even controlled not just by traumatic events but also by transgenerational family secrets to which they often do not have access. Moreover, the breaking of silence â the revelatory opening of family crypts â can have devastating consequences. Restoration of memory may have the power to reorganize the past and change the future, but it rarely possesses the magic required to reunite lovers or to restore wholeness to shattered lives.
The Ring of Recollection offers a major reappraisal of one of Indiaâs most prolific and respected contemporary writers.
Nancy E. Batty teaches English at Red Deer College, Canada. She has published in the fields of American and Postcolonial Literature.
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Introduction
The Kernel, the Shell, and a âfish-stinking ringâ. Notes Toward a Cryptomimetic Reading of Deshpandeâs Fiction
Haunted Beginnings. The Roots of Domestic Terror in Deshpandeâs Early Fiction
âI am like a house full of unclean things, never cleaned, never openedâ. The Maternal Crypt in The Dark Holds No Terrors
âyou can never be the heroine of your own storyâ. Peering Into the Otherâs Crypt in That Long Silence
âThis book is mine as all can tell, if you steal it you will go to hellâ. Transgressing the Otherâs Crypt in The Binding Vine
âWhat could my mother be to yours?â. Disinheriting the Phantom in A Matter of Time
âhealing in the wordsâ. Deshpandeâs Contract with the Dead in Small Remedies
Coda. âStill it movesâ
Works Cited
Index
Foreword
Introduction
The Kernel, the Shell, and a âfish-stinking ringâ. Notes Toward a Cryptomimetic Reading of Deshpandeâs Fiction
Haunted Beginnings. The Roots of Domestic Terror in Deshpandeâs Early Fiction
âI am like a house full of unclean things, never cleaned, never openedâ. The Maternal Crypt in The Dark Holds No Terrors
âyou can never be the heroine of your own storyâ. Peering Into the Otherâs Crypt in That Long Silence
âThis book is mine as all can tell, if you steal it you will go to hellâ. Transgressing the Otherâs Crypt in The Binding Vine
âWhat could my mother be to yours?â. Disinheriting the Phantom in A Matter of Time
âhealing in the wordsâ. Deshpandeâs Contract with the Dead in Small Remedies
Coda. âStill it movesâ
Works Cited
Index