In a culture where others constantly attempt to define individuals, how does one determine their identity for themselves?
Nirmala -
Sripathi's wife, Nirmala, is a virtually completely static character until the climax of the novel. All through her life, Nirmala has played the good Brahmin housewife. She has obeyed, respected, subserved. It takes a poignantly sharp fear, shortly after the pain of losing her beloved daughter to impel her to even consider changing.
On the night Nandana is lost, she is pushed to the edge, fraught with fear for her granddaughter, and questions if the way she has lived her life as ever truly benefitted anyone. As a woman of strong spirituality, she sees everything that happens in life as reactions, as the gods' messages of displeasure, anger, joy. In this frantic state of mind, she is pushed to questioning the very basis of what she has been taught will please the gods all her life. "For all the years of being a good wife, daughter-in-law and mother, this was how she was rewarded?" (p. 286, Rau Badami). Somewhere beneath the glossy coat of the pleasant wife, Nirmala reveals that she possesses surprising adaptability and resilience. A strength that was hinted at as she pulls through to support Nandana after Maya's death is shown to its full potential in the dark, rainy night. She fights back against her husband, her mother-in-law and even Arun, not willing to concede to anyone who stands in the way of getting the most help possible in the search for Nandana.
Later, she proves to us that this change was not through bitterness but rather through love, still caring for her husband as she did when she was his new bride. She seems to have much more confidence, standing up for choices that she believes in. When Mrs. Munnuswamy timidly suggests the marriage between Putti and Gopala, Nirmala surprises even herself in daring to support this decision without first speaking with Ammayya. But she recognizes the goodness in the proposal, and her clarity in seeing that this is what Putti truly wants as well affirms her capability to be a loving mother to her large family. All through the marriage, Nirmala is a strong pragmatist and manages to use her influence to accomplish bigger things than she had ever before, allowing us to see that this change in identity is not temporarily brought on by stress and fear but rather roused from that, and here for the duration.
For Nirmala, this affirmation in her identity comes all at once, in a huge realization. In her greatest moment of fear, she bursts above the waves of constricting culture and traditions that she has been swamped in all her life, and instead puts the well-being of her family and herself first and foremost.
Sripathi's wife, Nirmala, is a virtually completely static character until the climax of the novel. All through her life, Nirmala has played the good Brahmin housewife. She has obeyed, respected, subserved. It takes a poignantly sharp fear, shortly after the pain of losing her beloved daughter to impel her to even consider changing.
On the night Nandana is lost, she is pushed to the edge, fraught with fear for her granddaughter, and questions if the way she has lived her life as ever truly benefitted anyone. As a woman of strong spirituality, she sees everything that happens in life as reactions, as the gods' messages of displeasure, anger, joy. In this frantic state of mind, she is pushed to questioning the very basis of what she has been taught will please the gods all her life. "For all the years of being a good wife, daughter-in-law and mother, this was how she was rewarded?" (p. 286, Rau Badami). Somewhere beneath the glossy coat of the pleasant wife, Nirmala reveals that she possesses surprising adaptability and resilience. A strength that was hinted at as she pulls through to support Nandana after Maya's death is shown to its full potential in the dark, rainy night. She fights back against her husband, her mother-in-law and even Arun, not willing to concede to anyone who stands in the way of getting the most help possible in the search for Nandana.
Later, she proves to us that this change was not through bitterness but rather through love, still caring for her husband as she did when she was his new bride. She seems to have much more confidence, standing up for choices that she believes in. When Mrs. Munnuswamy timidly suggests the marriage between Putti and Gopala, Nirmala surprises even herself in daring to support this decision without first speaking with Ammayya. But she recognizes the goodness in the proposal, and her clarity in seeing that this is what Putti truly wants as well affirms her capability to be a loving mother to her large family. All through the marriage, Nirmala is a strong pragmatist and manages to use her influence to accomplish bigger things than she had ever before, allowing us to see that this change in identity is not temporarily brought on by stress and fear but rather roused from that, and here for the duration.
For Nirmala, this affirmation in her identity comes all at once, in a huge realization. In her greatest moment of fear, she bursts above the waves of constricting culture and traditions that she has been swamped in all her life, and instead puts the well-being of her family and herself first and foremost.