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A Feministic Analysis of The God of Small

Things:

A Postmodern Novel

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EDUCREATION PUBLISHINGShubham Vihar, Mangla, Bilaspur Chhattisgarh - 495001

Website: www.educreation.in __________________________________________________

© Copyright, Author

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, magnetic, optical, chemical, manual, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written consent of its writer.

ISBN: 978-93-5373-024-6

Price: Rs.800.00

The opinions/ contents expressed in this book are solely of the author and do not represent the opinions/ standings/ thoughts of Educreation.

Printed in India

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P r e f a c e

Ever since the dawn of history, human

beings have tried better ways of understanding life

and human relations. Feminism is one such branch

of scholarship which tries to explain the nature and

destiny of woman throughout the ages and tries to

foresee a bright future for humanity where there

will be no distinction on the basis of caste, creed or

sex. This study has revealed the great strength and

hidden potential of woman which when rightly

assessed and channeled will make a different world

full of happiness for all.

In this study an attempt has been made to

apply the present day feminist theories to the

famous novel The God of Small Things by Arundhati

Roy. Here the word ‗small‘ refers to woman who

has always been considered lesser in size than man.

The message of Arundhati Roy to all of us is to

recognize the God hidden in women and to protect

and worship this deity, so that we have a society

based on equality and justice and our country India

will truly revere the words, daughter, mother and

sister.

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This book begins with an Introduction of

Arundhati Roy and goes on to describe the concept

of feminism in the second chapter by explaining the

definitions and history of feminism. It also defines

certain key terms like Protofeminism, Liberal

Feminism, Radical Feminism, Marxist Feminism,

Human rights Feminism and Modern Feminism.

The third chapter titled An overview of the Novel is

an outline summary and thematic study of the

Bharati Mukherjee's novel The God of Small Things.

The study of the novel The God of Small Things from

a feminist perspective has been very revealing and

insightful forms the crux of Arundhati Roy's

accomplishments dealt with in the fourth chapter.

The concluding chapter is an exhaustive account of

the Roy's novel and her development as a creative

artist. With a view to ensure a proper appreciation

of her talents, the distinctive features of her

personal life have been enumerated and her

academic achievements frequently underlined.

I express my heartfelt gratitude to all those

without whose help I wonder I could have ever

succeeded in completing this book. My thanks are

due to my parents, who always taught me the right

values and encouraged me to go for higher studies.

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My special thanks are due to my wife Zareena

Akhter who has always been a continual source of

inspiration and motivation. I am greatly indebted

to the Librarian and the staff of the Allama Iqbal

Library,University of Kashmir and Central

Library,Jiwaji University Gwalior for their co-

operation and help.

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C o n t e n t s

Preface 3

Introduction 7

Definition and History of Feminism 20

An Overview of the Novel 54

The God of Small Things: A Feminist 108

Perspective

Conclusion 126

Select Bibliograpy 135

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Introduction

Arundhati Roy is one of those Indian

English writers, who do not remain ensconced in

the ivory tower and move in the glitter and

glamour as so many other literary celebrities do.

She seems to regard social problems as closely

touching the writer‘s sensibility and believes that a

genuine write does not remain aloof. This

perception of the writer‘s interaction with her

environment has motivated her to get engaged in

the contemporary social issues, and voice her

opinion against the injustices coming from

government or private agencies.

Here it is worth-mentioning that today our

society is experiencing tremendous transformation,

affecting its complexion and ideas. In the present

period, radical changes have been seen in almost all

walks of life, challenging the basic assumptions

and beliefs and bringing under merciless scrutiny

age-old faiths and theories. Arundhati Roy is one of

the foremost novelists of this tradition, showing

exceptional awareness of the social crises and

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sensitivity to the problems. The dilemma of the

modern Indian English springs from the elitist

background, most of them belonging to the upper

middle class equipped with an outlook and

education that does not normally lead to the heart

of those experiences that are associated with the

struggle for survival in a basically exploitative

society.

Suzanna Arundhati Roy (born 24 November

1961) is an Indian novelist and activist. She won the

Booker Prize in 1997 for her first novel The God of

Small Things. In the beginning of her career, Roy

worked for television and movies. She prepared TV

serials for Doordarshan and got attention from ITV

also. Electric Moon was scripted by Arundhati Roy

for Channel 4 in 1992. Bhaskar Ghose, the director

general of Doordarshan gave her all necessary

assistance to write her kind of screen plays.

Arundhati Roy attracted attention in 1994,

when she criticized Shekhar Kapur‘s film ‗Bandit

Queen‘, based on the life of Phoolan Devi. In her

film review titled, The Great Indian Rape Trick, she

questioned the right to ―restage the rape of a living

woman without her permission‖, and charged

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Kapur with exploiting Devi and misrepresenting

both her life and its meaning.

Here it is worth-mentioning that after her

first novel The God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy

has concentrated her writing on political issues and

these issues include the Narmada Dam project and

India‘s Nuclear Weapons. She was awarded the

Sydney Peace Prize in May 2004 for her work in

social campaigns and advocacy of non-violence.

Arundhati Roy is one of the contributors in

the book We Are One: A Celebration of Tribal People,

released in October 2009. The book explores the

culture of people around the world, portraying

their diversity and threats to their existence.

Arundhati Roy is one of the few Indian

English writers actively interested in contemporary

social-political issues which are amply evidenced in

a number of articles, interviews and books, she

wrote on various topics in recent years. Ms. Roy

has authored such thought-provoking works as

Confronting Empire, The Algebra of Infinite Justice, an

internationally acclaimed essay and War in Peace,

another powerful essay. Her other notable essays

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are The End of Imagination on India’s nuclear bomb

and The Greater Common Good.

Arundhati Roy‘s book Power Politics, which

has been acclaimed internationally, challenges the

idea that only experts can speak out on such urgent

matters as nuclear war, the privatization of India‘s

power supply by Enron and the construction of

monumental dams in the country which will

dislocate millions of people. This book was

published by South End Press of USA.

Roy published her second novel, The

Ministry of Utmost Happiness, in June 2017 twenty

years after her debut, The God of Small Things. The

novel was chosen for the Man Booker Prize 2017

Long List. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness was

nominated as a finalist for the National Book

Critics Circle Award for fiction in January 2018.

The novel weaves together stories of people

navigating some of the darkest and most violent

episodes of modern Indian history, from land

reform that dispossessed poor farmers to the

2002 Godhra train burning and Kashmir

insurgency. Roy's characters run the gamut of

Indian society and include an intersex woman

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(hijra), a rebellious architect, and her landlord who

is a supervisor in the intelligence service. The

narrative spans across decades and locations, but

primarily takes place in Delhi and Kashmir.

Arundhati Roy in her novel The God of Small

Things reflects a disturbing awareness and anxiety

for those who have been marginalized by the age-

old oppressive systems of society. Roy represents a

magnificent flowering of that line of women‘s

writing that discards all pretensions about social

decency or gender-related false assumptions and

invents a narrative that is much more effective than

any so far followed by her predecessors. She is

candid, frank and often brutal in laying bare the

seamy side of our socio-political systems.

In Arundhati Roy‘s opinion, political forces

that call themselves progressive and revolutionary

are frequently inclined to join hands with those

who have believed in strengthening the

exploitative sites, be it government agencies like

police or family. Her finest satirical art is reserved

for the deeply entrenched traditional family system

in which individuals are connected by hierarchical

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