Kamalapurnaiyamarkandaya was a twentieth century novelist from South of India. In her early years she travelled widely in India and europe. She was a journalist in India before migrating to London, England in 1948. She published her first novel, Nectar in a sieve, in 1954. Some of her other works include: Some inner Fury(1955),The Coffer Dams(1969), The Nowhere man(1972) and Two virgins(1973).
In Rukmani's quest for dignity, hunger is a potent enemy. Fear of hunger,she says,torments the peace of every peasant who lives by the vagaries of the wind and rain. Tired of constant hunger , her elder sons break ip the family to seek new lives in a new land. Another son resorts to robbery and is kiled for it, leaving to grieve for his mea ingless life. Her daughter chooses the degradation of prostitution over the degradation of starvation. Rukmani nealy becomes a murderer,thinking Kunthi has come to steal the last of their rice. In the city, Rukmani observes the suplican ts at the temple pushing and shoving like animals to secure their share of food. Similarly, beggar children snarl and fight like beasts over a scraped drop in the street. Rukmani indicts both the industrialization of the village,represented by the tannery, and the laws of land ownership impoverish and displace peasants like her and Nathan. In Nectar in a sieve, hunger breeds thieves,prostitutes,murderers and subhuman beasts. Not only nature's whims but also the choices of an unjust society produces the shameful misery of starvation.
In Rukmani's quest for dignity, hunger is a potent enemy. Fear of hunger,she says,torments the peace of every peasant who lives by the vagaries of the wind and rain. Tired of constant hunger , her elder sons break ip the family to seek new lives in a new land. Another son resorts to robbery and is kiled for it, leaving to grieve for his mea ingless life. Her daughter chooses the degradation of prostitution over the degradation of starvation. Rukmani nealy becomes a murderer,thinking Kunthi has come to steal the last of their rice. In the city, Rukmani observes the suplican ts at the temple pushing and shoving like animals to secure their share of food. Similarly, beggar children snarl and fight like beasts over a scraped drop in the street. Rukmani indicts both the industrialization of the village,represented by the tannery, and the laws of land ownership impoverish and displace peasants like her and Nathan. In Nectar in a sieve, hunger breeds thieves,prostitutes,murderers and subhuman beasts. Not only nature's whims but also the choices of an unjust society produces the shameful misery of starvation.
