Kamala Markandaya

Question- Write life and career details of Kamala Markandaya in detail.

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Life and Career Details of Kamala Markandaya

A Great Woman Novelist: Indian women, writing novels in English came to their own only after World War II, and Kamala Markandaya is one of the greatest of these women-novelists. She won International fame and recognition with the publication of her very first novel 'Nector in a Sieve, 1954. She is still alive and working.

Birth and Early Training: Markandaya is the pen-name of the novelist. Before marriage, she was Kamala Purnaiya, and she began using the pen-name 'Markandaya' when she took to writing. She was born in a well-to- do, rather orthodox, Brahmin family of Mysore, South India in 1924. Her father was a transport officer. Her father's work, involving frequent transfers, meant an "intemittent and casual" education for her, but also free travel, not only in India but in England and Europe. Mrs. Markandaya thinks that "the role of observer which every traveller assumes is good training for any writer..... It makes..... a good starting point, and I believe it was my starting point." It was in this way that she acquired that understanding of man and his life, which stood in such good stead in her career as novelist. As she belonged to "Westernised upper class". She had a first hand knowledge of western ways and manners, and this knowledge is fully reflected in her novels. It colours her language and her treatment of western characters.

Career as a Journalist: After a short period of schooling in Mysore, Kamala entered Madras University at the age of sixteen. How ever, she soon to took to writing and journalism and left the university without taking her degree. She graduated much later in her career. On leaving the university, she worked for a while on the staff of a short lived weekly newspaper and then took up the job of an army liaison officer. But her tastes were literary and the job did not suit her. Soon she gave it up, and started work as a free lance journalist in Madras and Bombay. As she wanted to know more of rural India, she lived for sometime in a South Indian village. This accounts for the extraordinary realism and authenticity of her treatment of Indian rural life.

Marriage: She migrated to England in 1948, and there she tried to, but failed, to get a job as a journalist. For sometime she was in financial difficulty, and supported herself by working as a proof-reader, as a secretary in some private firms, and in some other equally dull and soul destroying jobs. She married John Taylor, and is now finally settled in London. She has one daughter, Kim and is happy and contended. She is an extremely attractive woman who appears occasionally on English radio and television programs and who when she has time for such things, enjoys films, the theatre, and solitude. She is "anti-colonialist" and "anti-imperialist". East and west encounter is a major theme in her novels.

Recognition and Fame : She was awarded National Association of Independent Schools Award' (U.S.A.) in 1967 and the 'Asian Prize' in 1974. Calm and quiet by temperament, she does not like to talk much about herself. She seldom gives interviews to the press. However, we can know much about her from her novels. Joseph Hitrec has called Kamala Markandaya "one of the crispest and most warmly personal" of Indian writers, and Margaret Parton has found in her work "a brilliance and depth outstanding even among India's current crop of highly talented novelists."

Her Novels: A Prolific Writer:
She has eight novels to her credit, which may be listed as below:
(1) Nectar in a Sieve        1954
(2) Some Inner Fury         1956
(3) A Silence of Desire     1960
(4) Possession                   1963
(5) A Handful of Rice       1966
(6) The Coffer Dams         1969
(7) The Nowhere Man       1972
(8) Two Virgins                 1973
Conclusion: In the history of Indo-Anglian fiction, Kamala Markandaya occupies a very high place, indeed, "Women and natural story tellers", says Dr. K.R.S. Iyengar and Kamala Markandaya certainly is nothing if not a brilliant story-teller.

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