Anita Desai :

Human complexities thru psychological analysis

by W.T.J.S. Kaviratne - Ambalangoda Spl. Cor.

Anita Desai (Anita Muzumadar Desai) is an Indian novelist, short story and screen writer born in Mussorie, India to a German mother and a Bengali businessman D.N. Mazumdar.

She spoke five languages such as German, Bengali,Urdu, Hindi and English.

At the age of nine she wrote her first story.

She got married to Asvin Desai a director of a computer software company.

She was highly influenced by Virginia Woolf's Wuthering Heights, works of Nikolai Gogol, D.H. Lawrence and philosophical thoughts of existentialism in the portrayal of characters in her fiction.

Anita Desai is recognised as the 'Mother of Indian psychological novel genre in recognition of her approach of the psychological explorations she has done in her depiction of characters in her novels centred around India.

Anita Desai has used poetic language in her novels and she has said that she has turned to poetry for model and in her own words "It's more and more poetry I use as a model.

I'm more interested now in reading poetry than fiction. I think they use language in a way I would like to emulate. "

Human relationship

Complexity of human relationship has been identified as the most striking theme of her novels and she has made a very successful attempt in doing a deeper exploration of human psyche and through her characters in her novels she has unraveled the mysterious inner lives before the readers.

Almost all plots of her novels are based on the silent inner sufferings of women under the inhumane male domination of insensitive husbands, fathers and brothers.

Anita Desai has portrayed the majority of her male characters in her novels as responsible for the alienation of women.

As a consequence of withdrawal, loneliness, isolation, lack of communication and disintegration of the female protagonists portrayed in Anita Desai's novels finally culminated in tragedy and disaster.

In 'The Novels of Anita Desai - A Critical Study' by M. Rajeshwar and Manmohan K. Bhatnagar making observations on Anita Desai said, "her main engagement is to study human existence and human predicament."

Her explorations in her novels are a quest for self. 'She is the novelist of psycho-emotional situations and her theme is the individual against himself and against the milieu.'

Psychosomatic

Anita Desai's almost all female characters have been portrayed as affected by inner psychological sufferings of tension, worries, disappointment, anxiety and fear. Female characters in Anita Desai's novels appeared to be highly sensitive and live in their own inner dream world comprised of hallucinations and their own imaginations thus completely alienated from reality and their environment.

In addition, Anita Desai is a staunch proponent of the belief that better understanding between the husband the wife and the psychological adjustment of both partners are of paramount importance for the success of married life.

Characters of her novels lacking of better emotional understanding and psychological adjustments ended in tragedies.

'Cry the Peacock' vividly portrays how the female character gradually degenerated psychosomatic condition and failed miserably to adjust herself to the practical nature of her husband.

Maya the central female character of Anita Desai's novel 'Cry the Peacock' appeared to be a complete contrast of her husband Gautama.

Maya is portrayed as dreamy and sensitive while her husband Gautama is portrayed as realistic, rational, insensitive and detached and both of them appeared to be poles apart.

Due to incompatible temperament, the married life of Maya and Gautama became strained. Anita Desai has dealt on the issues of love, marriage and sex in her novels.

In the novel 'Cry the Peacock' Maya is portrayed as character believing on fate and superstition.

After the prophecy made by an albino astrologer that in the end of four years of their marriage she and her husband would die, she led a life of horror.

Anita Desai has probed into the suppressed hostility in her unconscious mind against her husband.

Denial of sexual gratification of Maya by her husband Gautama has been vividly exposed in the novel.

In Maya's own words, "Telling me to go to sleep while he worked at his papers, he did not give another thought of me, to either soft willing body or the lonely, wanting mind that waited near his bed."

Due to frustration, strained relationship and alienation developed and matured even to the extent of criminal instincts in Maya to kill her husband Gautama and to commit suicide.

Playing the role of an efficient and sensitive psychiatrist, Anita Desai in her novel 'Cry the Peacock' has made a psychological exploration on the neurotic Maya, her emotional background and her life style that she led at home under the loving care of her father.

Anita Desai's novel 'Voices of the City' (1965) portrays alienation, loneliness, and loss of identity. In the characters of brother, two sisters and their mother who had developed a relationship with Major Chadha.

Nirod the main character in this novel is worried of his mother's relationship with Major Chadha and the tragedy is based on love-hate relationship with his mother.