Kapur brilliantly portrays Shagun as a modern, bold, and daring woman who fights against social norms for her own sake but in the process, her identity gets fractured which brings distress for her.
Like all her novels, here too, Manju Kapur has given sensational beginning to the novel. Kapur opens the novel as following:
January 1st, 1998, the couple lay among stained sheets and rumpled quilts, eyes closed, legs twisted together like the knotted branches of a low growing tree….Eventually they dragged each other off the bed and into the bathroom. They hated this, they said as they washed and dressed, simply hated it. But they had kept their promise; they had heralded the New Year by making love. (Kapur 1)
The couple at the canvas is not husband …show more content…
However, after few years of married life, Shagun finds that this is not life what she has dreamed, as she was not happy with being an ordinary woman with two kids. She has aspirations for luxurious life and wants to become an independent woman. She was in search of new beginning and one day she finds a man who could drive her towards her dreamed destination. Ashok Khanna, a very brilliant, cunning man seizes Shagun’s aspirations in no time. He started fluttering her and she gets attract towards him. She falls in illicit love affair with Ashok, her Husband’s boss. After enjoying initial heyday in this illicit relationship, she finds herself unable to cope up with her familial duties and her new love. She feels suffocated in her married life and asks her husband for divorce. Murali Manohar rightly remarks about the situation of such married women who finds themselves entrapped with moral and immoral deeds. He comments in his book entitled Indian English Women’s Fiction, “One of the main problems for educated woman is marriage. Most of their problems are related to marriage” (Manohar 13). Manohar’s remarks explores the conflict of educated married women who have urge for separate identity and how they lost themselves while finding …show more content…
Everything was a glorious adventure, and being pregnant plunged her into the center of all attention. She didn’t throw up once, her skin glowed, her hair shone, her husband called her a Madonna, her mother said she was fruitful like earth, her in-laws looked proud and fed her almonds and ghee whenever they could get near her. (Kapur 84)
Raman also proved himself as ideal husband for Shagun but in passing times, everyone appreciated his work and he gets the award of more responsibilities that makes him busy all the day. Though he loves his wife, he could not give much time. Raman did his best to meet the target set by the company. However, he often worried for Shagun. One day he complains, “My wife complains she hardly sees me anymore. We have a small baby, it’s hard on her” (Kapur 88). A caring attitude reflects in the sentences.
Shagun has attraction for luxurious life and Raman wants to fulfill her wish by working more hard. Gradually Shagun finds her life monotonous in absence of Raman that brings distress for her. After eight years of first boy, the news of next pregnancy brings distress for her. Kapur comments, “Shagun was distraught. There might have been empty spaces in her life, but this was not how she chose to fill them” (Kapur 103). She was not happy with this development in her life, as she wants something different. She argues with Raman and says, “It’s not that, I’ll be thirty, Arjun is just becoming independent and I don’t want to
Like all her novels, here too, Manju Kapur has given sensational beginning to the novel. Kapur opens the novel as following:
January 1st, 1998, the couple lay among stained sheets and rumpled quilts, eyes closed, legs twisted together like the knotted branches of a low growing tree….Eventually they dragged each other off the bed and into the bathroom. They hated this, they said as they washed and dressed, simply hated it. But they had kept their promise; they had heralded the New Year by making love. (Kapur 1)
The couple at the canvas is not husband …show more content…
However, after few years of married life, Shagun finds that this is not life what she has dreamed, as she was not happy with being an ordinary woman with two kids. She has aspirations for luxurious life and wants to become an independent woman. She was in search of new beginning and one day she finds a man who could drive her towards her dreamed destination. Ashok Khanna, a very brilliant, cunning man seizes Shagun’s aspirations in no time. He started fluttering her and she gets attract towards him. She falls in illicit love affair with Ashok, her Husband’s boss. After enjoying initial heyday in this illicit relationship, she finds herself unable to cope up with her familial duties and her new love. She feels suffocated in her married life and asks her husband for divorce. Murali Manohar rightly remarks about the situation of such married women who finds themselves entrapped with moral and immoral deeds. He comments in his book entitled Indian English Women’s Fiction, “One of the main problems for educated woman is marriage. Most of their problems are related to marriage” (Manohar 13). Manohar’s remarks explores the conflict of educated married women who have urge for separate identity and how they lost themselves while finding …show more content…
Everything was a glorious adventure, and being pregnant plunged her into the center of all attention. She didn’t throw up once, her skin glowed, her hair shone, her husband called her a Madonna, her mother said she was fruitful like earth, her in-laws looked proud and fed her almonds and ghee whenever they could get near her. (Kapur 84)
Raman also proved himself as ideal husband for Shagun but in passing times, everyone appreciated his work and he gets the award of more responsibilities that makes him busy all the day. Though he loves his wife, he could not give much time. Raman did his best to meet the target set by the company. However, he often worried for Shagun. One day he complains, “My wife complains she hardly sees me anymore. We have a small baby, it’s hard on her” (Kapur 88). A caring attitude reflects in the sentences.
Shagun has attraction for luxurious life and Raman wants to fulfill her wish by working more hard. Gradually Shagun finds her life monotonous in absence of Raman that brings distress for her. After eight years of first boy, the news of next pregnancy brings distress for her. Kapur comments, “Shagun was distraught. There might have been empty spaces in her life, but this was not how she chose to fill them” (Kapur 103). She was not happy with this development in her life, as she wants something different. She argues with Raman and says, “It’s not that, I’ll be thirty, Arjun is just becoming independent and I don’t want to