Silence as a Motif in Kamala Markandaya’s Nectar in a Sieve

Abstract

With the evolution of feministic discourse, post-colonial female writers began to raise the voice of marginalized. Kamala Markandaya too belongs to this group and she uses ‘silence’ as a motif in her novels. Nectar in a Sieve which is considered a marvellous creation of her also reflects the same spirit. The present paper deals with the minute description of marginalized people’s suffering and struggle due to ‘culture of silence’ in the prevalent patriarchal system of the society specifically in rural India through the family of Rukamani and Nathan. In due course of the novel, it is observed that silence has been imposed forcefully on the people of the lower strata by the powerful in such a way that it became their weakness. It made them helpless and hopeless. They begin to think that they do not have power to bring out the change and completely retired themselves on the hands of God. The conditions of women were too miserable. For them the words of man stood as an authority and they had to follow them silently. Religious and socio-cultural practices moulded their psyche in such a way that they begin to consider ‘silence’ as their virtue and left everything to happen in the name of fate. Sporadic efforts to break this silence prove useless as neither from their own class nor from the higher one supported them in their attempts.