LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 20:3 March 2020
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

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A Feministic Perspective in Anita Nair's
The Better Man

Ms. B. Sumathi, Ph.D. Research Scholar

Better Man
Courtesy: https://www.amazon.com/Better-Man-Novel-Anita-Nair

Abstract

Anita Nair explores the women’s world in her novels. Her novels are embedded in the Indian culture and setting. The writer explains the agony women face in the modern India. Anita Nair was born at Mundakottakurissi near Shoranur in Kerala on January 23, 1966. Anita Nair portrayed her imaginary village as Kaikurissi in her first novel The Better Man. Nair’s love for her native place Kerala is echoed in her novels. Besides writing novels, Anita Nair is also a writer of poetry, prose, short stories, essays, articles, book reviews, travelogues, crime series and non-fiction.

Her first novel The Better Man is the exploration of inner conflicts of Mukundan. Even though the protagonist of the novel is Mukundan, who is a retired government servant (Assistant Works Manager); the novelist also depicts a few female characters who are victimized by the tyranny of the men in the family. His mother Paru Kutty asks Mukundan to take her to the city in which he lives to escape his father’s tyranny, but he abandons the idea. Her father married another lady Ammani. He feels guilty for his act as her mother died falling from the stairs. Her mother’s accident might have been a plan of her father. Anjana is another female character not comfortable with her husband; Ravindran who treats her brutally and hardly shared his thoughts and plans with her. This research paper titled ‘A feministic perspective in Anita Nair’s The Better Man’ explores the trauma of Anjana and Mukundan mother Paru Kutty who tries to break free from the restrictions of male-dominated family.

Keywords: Anita Nair, The Better Man, beloved, menacing, furious, tyranny, inner conflict, male-domination.

Introduction

The protagonist of the novel Mukundan, returns to his village Kaikurissi after his retirement as a government employee. His father lives in another residence with his mistress Ammani, their daughter Shanta and her family. Mukundan leaves his house at the age of eighteen in order to escape his father Achuthan Nair’s domination.

‘Amma’, Mukundan asked in a troubled voice, ‘why he is never satisfied with anything I do? Why is he so angry with me all the time?’ (17). As Mukundan was away from the village for a long time and his father was not active, the leadership of the village Kaikurissi was given to PowerHouse Ramakrishnan who won a lottery and became a millionaire. Mukundan stays in his village home where he was born, brought up and lived in the tyranny of his father.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Ms. B. Sumathi, Ph.D. Research Scholar
Department of English
Government Arts College. Coimbatore
sumathibaluz@gmail.com
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