Joseph-Ghosh-4/25

I was most interested in two key scenes that deal with Deeti and the handling of the body/sexuality. I chose to focus on two scenes: Deeti and naked Kalua(from Chapter 3), and Deeti/Chandan(from Chapter 6)

In Chapter 3, Ghosh writes: 'The events of that night had attained a guilty vividness in her memory. Often, as she lay beside her opium-dazed husband, her mind would revisit the scene, sharpening the details and refreshing certain particulars--all of this without her permission and despite her every effort to steer her thoughts in other directions. Her discomfort would have been greater still if she had believed that Kalua had access to the same images and recollections--but she had, as yet, seen no sign that he remembered anything from that night. Still, a nagging doubt remained, and since then she had always taken great care to avoid his eyes, shrouding her face in her sari whenever he was near(p. 58).' Eye contact, the most central connection, is avoided. Any notion of talking is completely avoided. It is, in many ways, the central definition of embarrassment: You know that I know that you know. To talk about it would be to add another layer of pain. I get the sense that Kalua has some conception of what occurred, and I think Deeti does as well. But, both are content to let it stay within themselves.

In chapter 6, we are witness to Chandan Singh's harassment of Deeti. Deeti, due to her financial constraints, cannot deny Chandon's offer of 'nourishing satua', but she does resist his sexual advances. There is a sense of partialism(like in 'Midnight's Children') in Chandon's advances towards Deeti. It becomes an almost deadly game of cat and mouse. Ghosh writes: 'But once past the door, he paid no attention to his brother and had eyes only for Deeti: even as he was entering he would brush his hand against her thigh. Sitting on his brother's bed, he would look at her and fondle himself through the folds of his dhoti; when Deeti knelt to feed Hukan Singh, he would lean so close as to brush her breats with his knees and elbows. His advances became so aggressive that Deeti took to hiding a small knife in the folds of her sari, fearing that he might attack her, right on her husband's bed.'

But Ghosh immediately brings this tension to an unexpected zenith:

'The assault, when it came, was not physical, but rather an admission and an argument.'