An Eccentric Woman Self-Discovery

Have you heard of the "Virgin Syndrome"? No, it is not a new ailment or an old one with a new name. As Rani Dharker looks at it, "The Virgin Syndrome is the obsessive desire to remain a virgin "�"� not to be confused with frigidity "�"� till married ...." Interested? The zaniest, funniest novel on the theme is Dharker's first novel The Virgin Syndrome.

The narrator, also the protagonist, is a highly eccentric young woman, facing problems in life which are gender-based as well as related to her own sexuality, along with the fact that she is an Indian. As she puts it: "Being an Indian is not easy, you have so many forces coming at you so swiftly you whirl this way and that, digging your toenails into the soil to keep from flying away." Maybe it is the impact of the effort that makes her fall on the pavement, though she pretends she is squatting in an attempt to examine her toenails.

 

In an attempt to be independent she takes up a teaching job after an interview in a dark room where the selection committee is hardly bothered about her presence or her answers. But she does not really enjoy teaching, especially admission time when "school was a scene out of Hieronymus Boschs's hell", parents rushing around negotiating donations and generally looking and feeling stressed. The realisation that the school she works at, accepts donations, is horrifying and a talk with the principal who is quick to point out: "Donations are for the benefit of the students schools." Indignantly, she counter-questions: "All the extras the students get, where do you think the money comes from?"

It is fun to waft through life breezily along with the young protagonist. One specially enjoys the description of the traffic stopping when the car she's driving, instead of moving forward, slides back and rests against a bus, propelling it forward. Her relief is short lived. Swerving to avoid a dog, she bangs into a cycle parked in a stand. "The cycle fell and like bowling pins, a hundred cycles fell one by one, wheels sprawled, stainless spokes glinting in the sun. I was red and sweating but it was so funny that I began to laugh." Anyone who manages to laugh in such a situation is to be commended.

Humour is not the only ingredient used to season the narrative, a touch of magic adds to the lightness of mood. 'Aashiyaanaa', the fortress like house that mesmerizes all its occupants and the Tapestry-of-the-world, have a magical quality which they share with the Curse and the Great Flood when the narrator's grandfather is saved by a mermaid (or is it a dolphin?).

The Tapestry-of-the-world that Aima seems to be working on all the time appears to have a life of its own, something the reader realises while approaching the end. Note the way it curls up ".....into the sky..... The embroidered trees were on fire, a forest fire."

The blending of the magical and the real is done so dexterously that one does not quite know where to draw boundary lines, spatial or temporal. The effect is generally that of a surrealistic landscape in which the Tapestry-of-the-world is not just a lifeless piece of cloth with embroidery on it, it becomes a symbol of life itself, to be specific, the protagonist's own life. So, with the sudden death of her parents in an accident, the Tapestry which she uses to cover their bodies, catches fire and turns into a conflagration, "flames leaping up crazily." Along with it, 'Aashiyaanaa' also catches fire but the narrator walks through fire possibly in an attempt to save the tapestry. As the sea had made way for Moses, the flames part for her, meeting over her head.

What does the fire symbolise? It would be simplistic to limit one's reading to interpret it as the passing of an era, though that appears to be the most obvious parallel. One is somewhat unhappy with the way the novel ends. It is much too abrupt and gives the impression that Dharker has used the fire to round off the novel in a hurry. Otherwise, it is a good read, at the same time an expose of the hypocrisies and double standards of our lives which we often choose to ignore.