Portrayal of Neuroticism in That Long Silence and Wife: A Critical Study

English

Indian English women novelists have favourably responded to the changedpsychological realties of Indian life after independence, give an authentictreatment to this situation. An interesting preoccupation of these writersappear to be delving into the labyrinthine depths of the Indian psyche andshowing its relation to society. And nowhere is this concern more obviousthan in the novels that figure neurotic characters. The characters are shownas grappling on the one hand with the changed realities of India life and thetrauma they entail and on the other hand with the psychic conflicts ofpersonal origin.Shashi Deshpande’s fictional works open up new vistas of the psychic realities of the life of modern Indian women. Her deep insight into the complexities of the human mind has enabled her to dive deep into the hidden instincts, faded memories, suppressed desires, half-forgotten dreams lying submerged under the ocean of the ‘unconscious’ of her women. Her Sahitya Academy Award winning novel That Long Silence, has deep psychoanalytic nuances as it studies the impact of conflicting forces, both internal and external, on the psyche of its protagonist, Jaya. Jaya faces a long-drawn agonized psychic conflict due to her temperamental mismatching with her husband. However, this does not happen for several reasons. She has to surrender to family and societal pressures. Not being able to say or write what she feels like saying or writing, she is forced to write what patriarchal society wants to read or hear. Deshpande establishes a perspective that women should be recognized, heard and understood; they must not be kept as cage birds; they must triumphantly sign of their true selves and transcend all sorts of oppressions. Bharati Mukherjee’s novel Wife narrates the tale of a young woman forced to emigrate to the United States following her marriage. The protagonist of Wife is an Indian woman who finds herself in an unknown country which is entirely hostile towards her.

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