Customer Reviews

Kamala Das: A selection with essays on her work (CRNLE writers series)

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This is a very interesting selection of the work of one of India's key writers, Kamala Das. It includes some of her poetry, short stories, an excerpt from her autobiography 'My Story' and finally a selection of critical essays on Das and her writing.

Das has been published since the 1960s, and has written in both English and Malayalam (under the name of Madhavikutty). It is interesting to see here ("Introduction") her articulation of the decision all writers face when English is a foreign language: in which language should one write? Does one use English, to write about subjects which might not otherwise be acceptable and risk losing the local audience; or conversely, does one choose to write in one's own language and possibly lose the outside audience?

One of the themes in her work is sexuality, and the place of Indian women in regard to marriage, sex, and freedom, and the difficulties women writers can face. Some of her writing can be very confronting (the short story on child prostitution springs to mind): she writes quite starkly about issues which have not always been given voice by women in her society.

The included critical essays are all interesting, and help to bring out some of the issues in reading and understanding her work. Personally I'm not a fan of Das' work, but I do recommend this collection if you're looking for a starting point into her writing, or even more generally as an example of Indian lit.