“The most absorbing single image in Anand is the opulent richness of a woman’s body. He is like Rubens or Goya, expressing the tremors and raptures of flesh.”
“she had a sylph-like form; not thin but full bodied within the limits of her graceful frame well rounded on the hips with an arched narrow, waist from which descended, the folds of her salwars and above which were her full, round, globular breasts jerking slightly for lack of bodice under her transparent muslin shirt.”2
Pandit Kalinath is a lust man and his intentions are fired after seeing the beauty and grace of Sohini. He wants to seduce her and for this he uses his caste grandeurs. He commands her to sweep his house so that he can fulfill his dark desire. It is noteworthy to find that the psyche of Bakha is contaminated and his views regarding his sister Sohini is Lawrentian in approach-
“ He looked at her and somehow a picture of her future life seemed to come before him. She had a husband- a man who had her, possessed her. He loathed the ghost of her would be husband that he conjured up. He could see the stranger holding her full breasts and responding with a modest acquiescence. He hated the thought of that man touching her. He felt he would be losing something. He dared not think what he would be losing. He dared not think that he himself-‘I am her brother’, he said to himself, to rectify his thoughts which seemed to be going wrong”3
The above sentences clearly shatter the pious relationship between a brother and a sister in Indian society. It means that Bakha is obsessed with the body of his own sister. In Duchess of Malfi written by Webster we can find this obsession with Ferdinand. He was also obsessed with the body of his own sister who was the duchess of Malfi. On the other hand Gulabo felt jealous with Sohini. This is one of the reasons that she says to her-
“Ari bitch! Do you take me for a buffon? What are you laughing at slut? Aren’t you ashamed of showing your teeth to me in the presence of man, prostitute.”4
Later in the market Bakha talks to few women for bread. He gets polite response from one of those women but another curses and abuses him. She says-
“Vay eater of your master’s she shouted. May the vessel of your life never float in the sea of existence. May you perish and die! You have defiled my house. Go! Get up, get up! Eater of your master! Why didn’t you shout if you wanted food? Is this your father’s house that you come and rest here?5
This is the same lady who prowls at the feet of a sage who chants cunningly ‘Bholenath’ every now and then. Bakha is mistreated by this lady even if he does some work for her. Ram Charan’s sister is another girl in this play who used to play with Bakha in her childhood. She looked ugly when she was a child but as a grown up girl she was beautiful and Bakha seduces her in his thoughts-
“ He had pictured her quite naked as he had seen his mother quite often when he was a child, and his sister and other little children. An impulse had arisen like a sudden tremor to his brain and darkened his thoughts. He had felt as if he could forcibly gather the girl in his embrace and ravish her.”6
In 1936 Coolie was published and in this novel also there are varieties of women characters. Characters like Gujri who is Munoo’s aunt, Bibiji, lady Todarmal are ill tongued. Parvati who is Prabha’s wife treats Munoo as her own son. Lakshmi, who is the wife of Hari also loves Munoo and satisfies her own sexual urge-
“And she lay down by his side and took him in her arms, pressing him to her bosom with a silent warmth which made him ache with the hurt of her physical nearness, which tortured him, harassed him, making him writhe with all the pent up fury of his adolescent passion, till in the magic hours of dawn it found an escape in death, in the temporary death of his body in her’s.”7
In the character sketch of Lakshmi the novelist has tried to depict false morality in some lower class women. In this novel there is also a Eurasian lady whose name is Mrs. Manwaring. She has sexual relationship with many men and she also has a soft corner for Munoo. To her he was the fittest man to satisfy her but she could not trap him because death trapped him very early. In Two Leaves and A Bud there are few interesting women characters. Sajani and Leila are the central women characters in this novel. Barbara neglects the love of Dr. De La Harve because she thinks that he cannot be an ideal husband and there are several problems in becoming his wife. The wife of Neogi symbolically stands for the exploited coolie women in the novel. Reggie uses her mercilessly and it has been described by the novelist in the following lines-
“And he squeezed her between the iron girders of his thighs, the solid blocks of his shoulders till the pyramid of his passions was contiguous to her parting. ‘ooi’ she cried, pain- marred, and afraid of being mutilated, don’t wriggle and writhe like that he whispered, tearing at the string of her trousers and throwing her down at the charpai where she had lain. She yielded to him, her body limp and contorted into a silent despair, her eyes agaze. At the wild sensual heat in his face, her heart, turned inward at the cold virginity that seemed to freeze her at the contact with him. He made a sudden upcharge as if he were dealing a deathblow to himself and to her and he swung her body hard, hard harder, tearing the flesh of her breasts, biting her cheeks and striking her buttocks till she was red and purple like a mangled corpse, ossified into a complete obedience by the volcanic eruption of his lust.”8
It is the height of exploitation which is pitiable. In India women are regarded as Devi or goddess but in reality they are exploited by men like Reggie Hunt. Dr. Anand has tried to project his characters as they are. Thus, we can say that there is certain sense of realism in his writings. Even today we cannot deny totally that women are exploited in their offices.
