'By God! If women hadde written stories'' (The Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale) The word 'Womanhood', first of all in Europe, appears in Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales which defines a woman together transcending individual roles and experiences like mother, wife, sister, widow and so on. 'The Wife of Bath' embodies the ideology of sexual economics. She is neither upper class nor lower, strictly a middle class woman living independently off her own profit. Being a widow, she remarries more than once and radically defies medieval conventions. Even in Indian manuscripts, it has inscribed about how some legendary women fought and challenged the conventional attitude of society. In this context, the word 'Womanhood' has been relevant in India also from ancient times and there are many legendary women ' Shakuntala, Madhavi, Satyavati, Gargi and so on who defied the conventional attitude of society and proved themselves. These historical legendary women were limitless, independent and lived lives on their own terms. Besides, even in modern time, Ahilyabai Holkar, Rukhmabai, Babytai Kamble, Savitribai Phule etc. have been such radical women of Indian history who fought for the women's rights in mainstream society. Later on, the Indian English literature has also been an evident of great women in literary canon. In Indian English literature, many female writers as Kamala Das, Taslima Nasrin and Amrita Pritam, who have been pioneers for the women and always advocated for women's freedom, rights and independent expression in the patriarchal society. These women vocalised through the narrative technique of literature. Basically, narration is nothing but telling the stories of one's own experiences. Thus, the present article highlights the idea of 'Womanhood' in a few works of Amrita Pritam through narrative technique of literature. The paper explores how Amrita Pritam narrates the side of woman in gendered and patriarchal society.
Research Scholar, Department of English, Nawal Kishore Bhartiya Municipal Girls PG College, Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University, Bareilly
