Author(s): Shivani Sharma

Abstract: The present paper is an attempt to discuss the postcolonial women writers of India like Shashi Deshpande and Kamala Markandaya belonging to two different decades and significantly projecting the quest of ‘self’ by their women characters in terms of pre-set social institution. This perennial expedition of women for their identity in the male-chauvinistic society is not restrained to India, but traverses across the world. The unending struggle of women to opt between the idealised womanhood by the society and the ‘self’ has been astoundingly dealt by Despande in Roots and Shadows and Markandaya in Nectar in A Sieve. The discussion is majorly concentrated on the role of the idealised womanhood as a barrier in the quest of identity and surpassing the hurdle to achieve one.

Keywords: self, postcolonial, women, ideal, myt.

Article Info: Received: 01 Jul 2022; Received in revised form: 25 Jul 2022; Accepted: 01 Aug 2022; Available online: 06 Aug 2022

DOI: 10.22161/ijels.74.23