Girish
asked
Indu Sundaresan:
Hi. It's not just the costumes and the customs that have 'evolved' but also the value systems and the societal norms. So does the author make a conscious effort to go back to the norms or present it with today's values for the reader to digest? Ex: The misogyny and oppression women faced by women in history, from today's stand point might be judged, but they were the norms of the time. what does the author do?
Indu Sundaresan
Interesting question. Times have certainly evolved as far as women's rights go (I know, there's still plenty of ground to cover yet).
In the novels of the Taj trilogy, I focus on two powerful women in the Mughal dynasty--Empress Nur Jahan and Princess Jahanara. They were both women living in an imperial harem, behind a purdah (veil), not seen by men outside of the imperial family.
The purdah, the confinement within harem walls, was actually, in 17th Century India, not so much a sign of oppression (we see it that way today, certainly) but a sign of wealth. It meant, literally, that the male principal had the means of looking after a large number of women; they did not have to get up every morning, sweep the front doorstep, draw water from the well, cook the day's meals--what common women did.
What I did in the novels of the Taj trilogy was to actively imagine this sort of confinement to be the norm. Then, I considered how these two women became powerful under those circumstances. If this is normal, how did they manipulate the situation to create authority--how then to gain the sort of power a man had outside of the harem's walls?
That Nur Jahan and Jahanara dabbled in court politics and shaped India's future and history from their time period is undeniable. How they did it, you see in THE TWENTIETH WIFE, THE FEAST OF ROSES and SHADOW PRINCESS.
In the novels of the Taj trilogy, I focus on two powerful women in the Mughal dynasty--Empress Nur Jahan and Princess Jahanara. They were both women living in an imperial harem, behind a purdah (veil), not seen by men outside of the imperial family.
The purdah, the confinement within harem walls, was actually, in 17th Century India, not so much a sign of oppression (we see it that way today, certainly) but a sign of wealth. It meant, literally, that the male principal had the means of looking after a large number of women; they did not have to get up every morning, sweep the front doorstep, draw water from the well, cook the day's meals--what common women did.
What I did in the novels of the Taj trilogy was to actively imagine this sort of confinement to be the norm. Then, I considered how these two women became powerful under those circumstances. If this is normal, how did they manipulate the situation to create authority--how then to gain the sort of power a man had outside of the harem's walls?
That Nur Jahan and Jahanara dabbled in court politics and shaped India's future and history from their time period is undeniable. How they did it, you see in THE TWENTIETH WIFE, THE FEAST OF ROSES and SHADOW PRINCESS.
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