I have always believed that the real history is made by ordinary people. I constantly come across the reappearance, in various forms of folklore, ballads, myths and legends carried by ordinary people across generations – Mahasweta Devi
Mahasweta Devi, A voice of Marginalized Culture by Jyoti Baburao Sarkale published by Authorspress is a study of the work of this doyenne of contemporary Indian Literature. Mahasweta Devi is of course renowned as a novelist, short story writer, playwright, essayist, columnist, magazine editor and a socio-cultural activist. To quote Jyoti Baburao Sarkale, “She lives what she writes, and writes what she lives a rare synthesis of word and deed: documentation of life leading to action and vice versa…She is also a celebrated icon of the Third World Literature in the academia… Her literary image has also been reshaped by Spivak, whose translations and theoretical formulations seek to place Mahasweta’s work in the international plane.”
Mahasweta Devi is a writer with a social purpose. She says, “Once I became a professional writer, I felt increasingly a writer should document his own time and history. The socio-economic history of human development always fascinated me.” Mahasweta Devi won the Sahitya Academy Award for the novel Aranyer Adikar in 1979 and also the ‘Padmashree’ in 1986 by the Indian government for her social work in the three Adivasi areas in the states of West Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. She won the Jnanpith Award in 1996 and the Ramon Magsaysay award in 1997. In 2006, she won the Padma Vibhushan again from the government of India.
In this book Jyoti Baburao Sarkale says, “Her (Mahasweta Devi’s) works bring to the surface not only the misery of the completely ignored tribal people, but also articulate the oppression of women in society…Since Mahasweta is a compulsive activist and writing occurs to her as an instrument in her battle against exploitation, encroachment on culture, exploitation of the tribals, socio-political diffrences, marginal women and so on…As such, in the bulk of her creative work, she realistically depicts the untold agonies endured by rural and urban fringe groups.”
The writer of this research study Jyoti Baburao Sarkale analyses three of Mahashweta Devi’s novels in depth – Rudali, Aranyer Adhikar and Mother of 1084. Illuminating and moving in turns this work takes us into the life and writings of Mahashweta Devi. It motivates us to read Mahasweta Devi for ourselves and to engage with some of the issues that have occupied this great writer and activist.
