Their Book Of Revelations

Not a big fan of erotica by Indian writers, I was in two minds, quite honestly, about reviewing Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows, the third novel by Balli Kaur Jaswal, a 33-year-old Ind­ian author born in Singapore. The book has received rave reviews, with The Economist saying, 바카라�Ms Jaswal has written a funny and moving tale of desire and its discontents. It serves as a rem­inder that even the most traditional societies often come in 50 shades of grey바카라�. The Straits Times, strongly recommending the novel, declared: 바카라�If you like your erotica with a social conscience, this is the book for you.바카라�

A dark and heart-warming comedy, the novel offers a sneak peak into the chequered lives of Punjabi widows, forced to remain in the intimidating shadows of their fathers, husbands and brothers, but whose pristine white 바카라�dupattas바카라� deceptively camouflage their deepest sexual desires and erotic fantasies, linked intrinsically with their sense of self-worth, their place in a highly patriarchal, top heavy, familial structure where a woman was seen mostly as a vague sexual prop intended to provide pleasure to a man and procreate, and where the right to pleasure, a fundamental feminist right, is shrouded in 바카라�sharm바카라� (shame) and sin.

According to The Bookseller, Harper­Collins bagged Erotic Stories in a 바카라�strong바카라� six-figure deal to win the title at an auction. Director Ridley Scott바카라�s production company, Scott Free Productions and Film4 have subsequently bought the film rights to this engagingly fast-paced book that offers a scathing commentary on the humdrum daily life in Southall, a vibrant London suburb home to a sizeable Punjabi population, and which is often described as a 바카라�mini-Punjab바카라� or 바카라�Little India바카라�. The narrator is Nikki, a 22-year-old, fiercely independent, self-appointed 바카라�fem fighter바카라� who signs up to teach a creative writing course to older Sikh women바카라�Preetam Kaur, Tarampal Kaur, Sheena Kaur, Manjeet Kaur and Arvinder Kaur, among others.

Hired to help them write stories바카라�to be combined in an anthology바카라�Nikki surpr­isingly discovers that she has been tri­c­ked by her boss into teaching a group whose members are unable to read or write in English. The story picks up mom­entum when the widows present an alternate plan of composing stories that Sheena will subsequently transcribe. Having led sexually repressed, staid, colourless lives, readers, like Nikki, are taken aback when they start narrating del­iciously saucy and sordid sexual sagas, part imaginary, part voyeuristic, part sur­real, that aspire to relive their most intimate moments바카라�such as 바카라�using ghee to grease things up down there바카라�, referred to as the 바카라�oldest trick in the book바카라�. One of Nikki바카라�s students, Manjeet, confesses cranking her arm up and down, 바카라�I was given a useful tip to please my husband if he wanted it during my time of the month. Let him put it in your armpit, then do this. He liked it. He said it had the same feeling as my private parts바카라�hairy and warm바카라�. To which Preetam, another widow, adds ironically, 바카라�many women didn바카라�t know what was expected of them until their wedding night바카라�. Jaswal hits just the right scale in her cross-cultural characterisation바카라�the way East meets West in a classic tradition of tackling modernity.

Almost all of the widows바카라� stories are laden with references to 바카라�aubergines바카라�, 바카라�cucumbers바카라�, 바카라�sticks바카라� and 바카라�lady pockets바카라�바카라�reflecting a closeted, stubborn sexual vocabulary, that are humorous, human, and horny, while simultaneously also reflect the way most of these women have been painfully gagged into a stony sexual silence over centuries. Such Asian cultures thrive on submission and sob­riety, yet are brimming over with forbidden fantasies, ranging from same-sex attraction, sec­ret lovers who are smuggled into roofs and garages, kinky positions that are conditioned to be viewed as 바카라�dirty바카라�, and self-­pleasure바카라�topics that are larg­ely taboo, soon placing Nikki and the illicit nature of her class at a grave risk in a community patrolled by a group of unemployed men referred to as the 바카라�Brothers바카라�, who 바카라�consider themselves Southall바카라�s morality pol­ice바카라�, offering bounty-hunting services to families with so-cal­led wayward daughters, patro­lling temple grounds and constantly reminding people to cover their heads.

The unsolved deaths of Kar­ina, Gul­shan and Maya, three rebellious young women who dared to cross the stringent lakshman rekha of their tight-lipped, conservative community and form the subject of scandalous rumours that point fingers at their character and their family values, lace the background of this novel, with a bone-chilling suspicion that literally keeps readers on their toes. With Nikki, they desperately piece together the missing fragments of the puzzle.

Why must these widows degenerate into 바카라�de-sexed바카라� creatures after they lose their husbands? Why they are expected to exist in a permanent state of mourning and misery? Why they are expected to forgo physical desire and turn to rigorous religious discipline바카라�these hard-hitting questions simmer at the root of this multi-­layered narrative. The erotic stories are testaments of the widows바카라� individuality, but are also scathing statements of rebellion that have a transformative effect on their own lives just the way they emp­ower Nikki and the larger Punjabi community in South­all, that has until then swept its repressive ways of living under the carpet.

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Wid­ows, with its refreshing wit and wisdom, emanates the same crossover appeal as East is East or Bend It Like Beck­ham. Singapore-born Jaswal, raised in Japan, Russia and the Philippines and having studied creative writing in the United States, has employed her own immigrant Punjabi upbringing to sensitively view and consequently treat controversial sub­­­jects바카라�from hushed up honour killings, stifling monotony in marriages, to the underlying sexist hyp­ocrisy of arranged marriages바카라�creating a canvas both tumultuous and therapeutic. The novel, a racy crime-thriller packed with the right rom­antic punches, works also as a soulfully seething social commentary that leaves one with questions on how gender equality is irrevocably linked to larger cultural identity. And how we rarely ascribe gory gender violence or sexual longings to a community that is universally synonymous with valour, service and peace.

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows is filmi, fatal, fabulous!