Writers’ take on how marriage works

Thiruvananthapuram: The session was over, it was time for Q and A. An old man stood up, and made small steps towards the centre. His was not a question but a statement, perhaps echoing the crude sentiment of patriarchy, not hidden by urban covers, when the venue is a small town like Chengannur. Put very simply,

“If a marriage should work, the lady should be very mature.” One of the writers on stage, Preeti  Shenoy, six books old, asked, “What about the men?”

She had just finished a discussion with writer Shinie Antony on ‘Matters of the Heart’ at the third edition of the South India Writers’ Forum, annual literary festival organised by People for Performing Arts and More (PAMPA) in association with Kerala State Youth Welfare Board.

Preeti and Shinie spoke of heartbreak and unrequited love, of lust put against love, of infidelities and divorces and death. It is true, they said, the percentage of divorces is a very small number in India. But that was only on paper. Husbands and wives live in two corners of the same house, that’s divorce too, mentally, if not legally.

Here, Shinie quoted R. K. Narayan to narrate the lines M. S. Subbulakshmi told her husband who was knocking on her door.

“Go away, it’s not proper. People will see.” But today, divorces were more common to middle-aged couples, who didn’t think there was a need to live a lie once the kids had settled.
Preeti, who wrote about separation and infidelity in her books, said the scene has changed in urban India. “Women told me I have crawled into their heads and told their story. A man tweeted he never realised what a terrible husband he had been.”

In India, ‘the other woman’ has always been living with the family, it’s the mother-in-law, Shinie jokes. Preeti agrees, “I believe you should live alone when you get married, we don’t let our children grow up.”