SHASHI DESHPANDE'S ROOTS AND SHADOWS: A FEMINIST READING

Abstract

The literary work of Shashi Deshpande is a verbal representation of past and present, East and West, Tradition and Modernity. She seldom writes in isolation because she inherits the tradition and simultaneously makes an effort to create new spaces beyond those established conventions. While representing past and traditions, she has tried to break the barriers of tradition. Roots and Shadows explores the inner self of Indu, who symbolizes  The New Women who are educated and live in close association with society brushing aside all narrow social conventions. Through the character of Indu, Deshpande is portraying the inner struggle of an artist to express herself through her real self through her inner and instinctive potentiality, i.e. creative writing. So the present article is an honest attempt to study the portrayal of the Indian woman in her novel Roots and Shadows from the feminist point of view.