Book Review Perumal Murugan’s novel, One Part Woman , which attracted unnecessary controversy in Tamil Nadu recently, is essentially about the fundamental complementarity of the male and the female components of humanity. “The male and the female together make the world,” as the priest in the Ardhanareeswara temple tells Kali, the protagonist. Within each individual too there exists both the male and the female components. Who destroyed that harmonious balance between the male and the female? Is it the Brahmin who expediently creates and imposes certain rules and regulations on the people? The novel raises this question when a Brahmin lawyer gets toddy and arrack banned in the Salem district and thus throws the whole Sanar community out of “their traditional livelihood.” But the novel never suggests that the Brahmins have been responsible for the loss of certain traditions. It does not even suggest that the traditions are sacred or ...
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