Scent of a woman

Dolls’ wedding and other stories
Chaso
Penguin
2012, pp 179
299

Translating a collection of short stories so deeply rooted in the culture of a place that one can almost hear the voices of the characters and smell the pulusu is no laughing matter.

Marxist writer Chaganti Somayajulu, one of the giants of the Telugu literary world, went by the name Chaso. The collection of his short stories, Dolls’ Wedding and Other Stories, has been translated from Telugu by Velcheru Narayana Rao and David Shulman.

The stories from this collection are set between the 1940s and the 1980s, though most of them are from the early decades. The stories are understated and seemingly simple, but make a telling statement on the socio-economic realities of those decades. Chaso’s stories hold a mirror unto the largely patriarchal, feudal and agrarian society of those times. His women are strong, and they have to be, because the men are too drunk on power.

It is the woman in most of his stories who deals with real issues. Take the first story in the collection, Got to go to Eluru. Manikyamma is the second wife of a 60-year-old. A young woman, who could not have crossed 30. She seduces a young neighbour, has a child by him, and then her husband dies. But, because she has begotten a son, her husband’s inheritance is her son’s. Or she would have had to reconcile to a life of a lonely widow with a shaven head, doing odd jobs for the in-laws.

Manikyamma has no regrets doing what she does, but without openly telling us why she did what she did, Chaso is making a statement on the inhuman manner in which widows were treated in those times. The Dolls’ Wedding is also a similar story.
There’s Lady Karunakaram where the heroine is not exactly a victim, but one who lives on her own terms, even exploiting her husband’s naivette and becoming an adulteress. In that sense, Chaso’s heroines are brave women, who are willing to take control of their lives.

There are stories that leave a lump in the throat too, and one such is The Violin. This is the story of Rajyam and Venkatappayya, a couple who care deeply for each other, and the sacrifices they make for each other, especially when Rajyam falls ill and the husband has to fend for her during her illness.

Chaso’s intolerance towards superstition is mirrored in It didn’t rain here. The protagonist comes across a series of signs (a black cat, a barber, etc) that tell him all will not be well. And yet, everything turns out fine.

A common thread that runs through most of the short stories is a constant challenging of accepted notions. A constant questioning. The author has a great empathy for ‘the other’. This ability to look at ‘the other’ is mirrored in the short story, Fine, Enjoy it. It talks about a prostitute who has offered her son in adoption, but continues to follow the son’s life from a distance. A moving story, without overt sentimentalism, a hallmark of all his stories.

Even the last story of the collection, Transfer, where a married woman is in love with another married man, but is betrayed by the lover. A story which is
inherently emotional, is devoid of sentimentalism. The story is narrated in the first person by the woman. One feels for her, but towards the end, in typical Chaso fashion, she is in control of the situation. She makes peace with her reality, tells her lover to go back to his wife, and brings a change in her own husband.

Coming from a time when women still played second fiddle, when the farmer was still not the owner of land, from a feudal Andhra, Chaso’s stories are remarkably progressive. An interesting collection.