TAMIL SHORT STORIES

 

Known as one of the early feminist Tamil writers, R.Chudamani’s select stories are most relevant today as you would realise while studying each short story, a real life slice from our own lives and conversations.n ‘A Chair and Death’, where the aged mother defies class distinctions by allowing her maid’s son to sit on the chair with the family while watching TV and then being forced by the objections of her family members to allow the child to sit only in her presence, the class and caste distinctions that continue to sway Indian families is examined sans judgment.

“Herself’ is a powerful short story. This captures a married daughter’s turbulent emotions when she returns to her parental home,with a longing to be thoroughly pampered by her mother and is shocked to find that her mother is no longer at her beck and call.

She struggles to discover that her mother has made an identity of her own. She questions her father about why he is not objecting to this and fails to understand his rationale that throughout her life, the mother has served the husband and children and now, she  his rationale that throughout her life, the mother has served the husband and children and now, she has found the true meaning of her life by making independent choices. The shock and confusion in the daughter’s mind is brilliantly captured in this story.