Desai’s Cry the Peacock- A journey to the voiced world

Abstract

Women are the marginalised section of the society. But they cannot remain voiceless for long, they have to speak and find an outlet for their tears and fears, anguish and anger, thus register their existence. The voices resisting exploitation are fully aware of their own strength and dignity. The age-old existence of oppression, despair and suffering is common in the lives of marginalized classes across countries and continents. It’s an archaic system that has produced the men who run the country negotiate domestic and foreign policy and penned sexiest laws that made it easier for women to slide through the cracks. Woman is marginalised defined only by her difference from male norms and values in every country and culture. Anita Desai, one of the Indian novelists focussed on women’s situation in Indian society, whose leading voices has given the inner description of women’s inner world, her sensibility, her sulking frustration and the storm raging inside her mind. Her Cry The Peacock, presents the story of a young sensitive girl obsessed by a childhood prophecy of disaster. The novel points the role and contribution of patriarchy and patriarchal values towards misery, suffering, loneliness and unhappiness of women. Desai’s heroine in the novel chooses to remonstrate and fight against the general accepted norms and currents. The thoughts of the women protagonists in the novel are sure to crop up in her struggle to live their desired life. The main focus of the paper is to discuss a journey of a woman who confronts the gender-oriented tradition in search of her true self.