The Story of My Experiments with Writing Life: Problematising the Feminine Pen?

Abstract

Literature, I teach my students In the Hudsonian style, holds a mirror up to life. But, I add in the Chandramati manner, that this mirror is often concave or convex. The reflection it gives the reader may not be quite truthful to the original. The question of authenticity in treating the facts of life in fiction is as old as the first fiction itself But when life is treated as such by writers of fiction, life winds itself back on the writer. This is especially so if the writer is a woman. I am going to share with you some of the experiences I had as a practitioner of the genre.