Illustration by Uday Deb

Mamoni recalls her fondness for Kamala Das’s writings

My first brush with Kamala Das’s writing was way back in 1976 when I had stopped over at Hong Kong on my way back from Japan. I was standing by a roadside bookstall when my eyes were drawn to the cover of a book. Written in bold prints were the words “Acclaimed as one of the best books of 1976” and below was the name of the writer, Kamala Das.

It was her most famous book ever, My Story.

From the moment I started reading her story, I was hooked to the book and forced to complete it on the flight itself on my way back to India.

My mind was in turmoil. Here was a writer, a woman to boot, who had exposed her life and herself like never before.

Some parts of the book were so bluntly frank that I had goose pimples. In some pages, I saw a reflection of my own life.

Kamala’s description of her English teacher who would play the piano and sing Britons shall never be slaves touched a chord.

In Kamala’s teacher, I found Miss Powell who was my teacher at Pine Mount School, Shillong. Like Kamala’s teacher, Miss Powell would also play the piano and sing carols and we would sing along.

Kamala’s description of her ancestral home at Nalapet and her family had brought back memories of my own ancestral house and some of my own relatives.

What caught my attention was the description by Kamala about her grandmother’s sister whom she called Amalu.

Amalu was almost a carbon copy of my own aunt Naman bai, who later became the main character Durga in my novel Moth-eaten Hawdah. But unlike Naman bai who became a widow at a very young age, Amalu remained a spinster all her life.

Naman bai had even started writing a story which she had shown me. She had learnt to read and write at home. I had then just started to read Assamese. I still remember the day. It was in our house at Chenikuthi in Guwahati and my aunt’s bed was close to my study table.

As I was studying one evening, Naman bai picked up a notebook and handed it to me.

“Take, read this — I have not shown it to anyone”. It was the tragic story of a widow named Nirmala. I could sense that Nirmala was none other than my Naman bai.

Imagine my surprise when I read about Kamala’s Amalu, who, too, had written many poems. This collection of poetry was discovered by Kamala 30 years after Amalu’s death at their Nalapet house.

Among the poems Kamala had discovered was Amalu’s “affair” with Lord Krishna. “My chastity is my only gift to you, Oh Krishna!”

Separated by hundreds of kilometres, yet Kamala’s Amalu and my own Naman bai lived similar lives. (To be continued)