In the novels, it is their individual struggle with family and society through which they plunged into a dedicated effort to carve an identity for themselves as qualified women with faultless backgrounds. Manju Kapur addresses many issues that are related to the middle class women. Even, a girl has the right to make her own choices in life is an issue dragged this way and that, for a long time in our country. Facing equal assault from the chauvinists who declare that women’s place is inside the house, and the feminists who condemn the idea of taking the husband’s surname after marriage, the idea finds a middle path here. There is after all a difference between possessing and protecting. The image of new women in recent writings has undergone a sea change. Her novels A Married Woman and The Immigrant deals with the concept of patriarchy and their struggle for emancipation. A Married Woman is also not an exception. The novel charts the journey of a woman, who fights the incompleteness of her life and finds her happiness finally.
In A Married Woman Astha is a woman of middle class family. She is an educated girl. Her parents wanted her to study that’s why she was able to complete her post-graduation. Astha’s mother often declared, “There is a time for everything” (20). Soon, she was married to Hemant, a foreign returned. He was a very caring …show more content…
She was an earning woman; why could she not have a say in how some of her money was spent. She never said anything when Hemant chose to squander money on airline tickets, why could she not buy a box she liked? The male dominance was clear:
“Nine thousand five hundred rupees spent on one of the worst weeks of my life, thought Astha, as she stepped into the hotel bus for the airport. She thought hopelessly of all the things she could have done with that money, of the beautiful silver box she could have possessed and admired for ever. But their money spending was decided by him, not by her.” (p.
In A Married Woman Astha is a woman of middle class family. She is an educated girl. Her parents wanted her to study that’s why she was able to complete her post-graduation. Astha’s mother often declared, “There is a time for everything” (20). Soon, she was married to Hemant, a foreign returned. He was a very caring …show more content…
She was an earning woman; why could she not have a say in how some of her money was spent. She never said anything when Hemant chose to squander money on airline tickets, why could she not buy a box she liked? The male dominance was clear:
“Nine thousand five hundred rupees spent on one of the worst weeks of my life, thought Astha, as she stepped into the hotel bus for the airport. She thought hopelessly of all the things she could have done with that money, of the beautiful silver box she could have possessed and admired for ever. But their money spending was decided by him, not by her.” (p.