3 Review(s)

The God of Small Things, the international bestseller that shot its writer, Arundhati Roy, to fame and social activism, is a novel that challenges the established conservative fabric of the Indian society. The novelist has her childhood experiences and her vision cider-pressed into words which form the various patterns of the poignant suffering and helplessness of the powerless class in their dispossession, displacement and severe marginalization. To be sure, no other novel has voiced the voice of the silenced class so unequivocally. This work examines very closely the contours of marginalization and dispossession of men, women, children in the patriarchal family and society of the novel, entrenched in humbug beliefs and customs that trample on human dignity and the right to life fully.