That Long Silence/ Shashi Deshpande

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Shashi Deshpande is perhaps ideally suited to tread the labyrinthine tracts of human pysche and creditably represents it in her fiction. Her novels, particularly 'The Dark Holds No Terrors' and 'That Long Silence' - are an education in the psyche of people who lose their capacity for rational thought on being subjected to traumatic experiences.

The novel is about Jaya Kulkarni, an apparently satisfied housewife. Having married a responsible man, Mohan, and blessed with two children, Rahul and Rati, and a home and material comforts, she seems to have almost nothing to ask for in life. However, to achieve this stage of fulfilment, Jaya has systematically suppressed every aspect of her personality that refused to fit into her image as wife and mother. Two such most important aspects are : her writing career and her friendship with Kamat.

Deshpande has adopted the stream-of-consciousness technique which helps her to successfully bring out the inner workings of the mind of characters. A smooth lenear development of the narrative would not have facilitated the two and fro movement in time of Jaya's consciousness. The use of this technique reminds us of Dorothy Richardson's 'Pilgrimage' in that there is significant assertion of autbiographical undercurrents in the novel.

Thus, the novel is about how Jaya accepts her boundaries and then moves on to redefine her relation with the world. Her psychology is probed and we witness anxiety of how she would respond to the situation she finds herself in.

A book recommended for all..but do not expect it to be like a fiction or story...it is more like some aquaintance baring her heart and life before you.