Bringing home a Girl

A man's face is his autobiography. A woman's face is her work of fiction. ~Oscar Wilde

Why should we always draw lines between the pinks and the blues? Why do they clearly label genders? Why boys don’t cry and girls don’t play with cars ever? Why are we raised so differently? How would it make a distinction to make a boy play with a doll and allow the girl to go to a military school? Does that make a boy any lesser and a girl masculine to coerce anyone? These disparities in sexual roles have raised several issues over years.

Since the time of Adam and Eve, women have always been condemned to be an evil shadow. Since, she brought the ‘Fall of Man’ she is considered to be the perpetrator of degradation to mankind. She is punished ruthlessly, beaten up irrationally, hunted down like a witch, stoned to death, raped brutally and killed hard-heartedly as an infant. It is presupposed in many Eastern societies how women can bring humiliation to a family. Women are considered to be an honour, yet objectifying her, parents get the girl-child married in order to get rid of her. By the convention of Dowry, one categorically objectifies the women. Kept in the captivation and dooming her of the knowledge of which she is righteous, portrays a cowardly world of mankind. With the use of force (i.e. rape, conditioning) women are shut in the darkness of fear.

“One is not born a woman, one becomes one.” ~Simone de Beauvoir

Women, however, had become puppets and pretty dolls in the hands of men. Force, rebel and struggle have now become the new voices of women. The self-sacrifice, quiet, docile women have now found ways to brush their way through the hurdles. We no longer see a Cinderella whining in her apron, a Rapunzel seeking a refuge in her prince, a Bella to be escorted by a vampire or a wolf. We don’t even need a Joan to sacrifice her life, a Sita to prove her loyalty or a Draupadi as a pawn in the hands of her husbands.

Women, now, have openly flaunted their power, knowledge, and skill, receiving public recognition and honour. There are females who manage to brandish power in societies that try to bound it or ruling female submission; where their leadership is stigmatized and their creativity scorned and women who resist and overthrow oppressive traditions and regimes, who break the rules in defiance of unjust legal and religious "authorities" and who pursue their vision in spite of their personal cost.

Women have determined the course of events and the forms of human culture. They have originated, founded, governed, prophesied, created great art, fought for the rights, and for the peoples. These are the women edited out of history, their stories omitted, distorted, and replaced with an endless litany of men (and the occasional queen or meddling concubine). The ignorance of these women is greatly compounded by the omission of information on societies which accorded females power in public life, diplomacy, religion, medicine, the arts as well as family structure and inheritance. Both racism and sexism are implicated in these silences and gaps.

“A woman's hopes are woven of sunbeams; a shadow annihilates them.”
~George Eliot.

There are many women who have changed the face of the world. By bringing minimal difference, they bring about huge changes. Benazir Bhutto (Former Prime Minister of Pakistan) said

“…I can deal with political differences, but how do you deal with it when someone says I don't like you because you're a woman and you've taken a man's place."

It was not easy for women to achieve these milestones as easily as men did. However, Margaret Thatcher (Former Prime Minister of Great Britain) did not believe that quota systems were the answer to get more women in politics - she thought this might affect the quality of women at the top. She said,

"I don't want to get to a position when we have women because they're women, we want to have women because they are able and as well equipped as men and sometimes better."

Many strong figures in the history have marked women’s position on high plinth like, Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria, Cleopatra are to name a few. That does not stop women. They have made progress in every field possible. There are prize winning poets, authors, laureates, scientists, singers, dancers, painters. Women have now touched the corporate world and broke the glass ceiling. There have been several women entrepreneurs. Today there are 9.1 million women-owned businesses in the U.S., representing nearly 40% of all businesses. Women account for $7 trillion in consumer and business spending. Women make 80 percent of healthcare decisions and 68 percent of new car purchase decisions. Women are starting new firms at twice the rate of all other businesses. Through time, gradually, over a period of time women have liberated themselves from the shell. Women in power have proved themselves through their action.

By identifying Eve as a temptress, she was seen as playing the same role as the evil serpent that had tempted her, thus linking the two. In art, the link between women and evil is made visually apparent by showing the serpent as a woman with snake-like lower parts. The image of the monstrous serpent-woman cleverly identifies both the source of evil and its nature. Myth plays very vital role in portraying women’s sexuality and has shown women to be obscure and sinful.

Women’s sexuality is reaching its peak in today’s world in terms of the ability to freely practice and talk about it. This, however, was not always the case. In Victorian times, women were not allowed to enjoy sexual satisfaction and were often considered to be responsible for the moral decline of society if they did. Sexuality has evolved into what it is today through the writings of many activists, a change in view of what is considered morally right, and more emphasis being placed on the sexual act as something that is natural and acceptable in women’s lives.

The 1960’s counterculture and predominant ideas of leading lives filled with ‘sex, drugs and rock and roll,’ also signified advancement for women’s sexuality. The 1960’s are often times referred to as the decade of the ‘sexual revolution,’ free love and sexual gratification being at the top of the agenda. Women’s sexuality was no longer confined within the boundaries of conjugal interactions. According to Female Sexuality by Precilla Y.L. Choi and Paula Nicolson, in the years since the 1960’s the sexual ‘double standard’ has been lifted. Sexual pleasure is not just something to be enjoyed by men; it is for women as well. It has become more socially acceptable for women to enjoy the pleasure of sex and reach orgasm.

Although illegal today, prostitution can be viewed as a woman’s right to control her sexuality. Many female prostitutes use the ‘it’s my body I can do what I want with it,’ argument to support their chosen profession. It is unclear if prostitution is more prevalent in today’s society than in Victorian times, but it can be said that today it is more often a choice that the woman consciously makes, as opposed to being forced into it. Women have also used her body to her advantage, in terms of modelling and advertising.

Talking about sexual preferences, women have been open about their choices in partners. Many women have engaged themselves into a homosexual relation. Women have also found themselves a pleasure in having multiple relations rather than one. They no longer stick to committed relations and have learned to ‘move on’. This has brought a change in appearance of women’s traditional role.

Based on five years of research and an online survey of 1,000 women, the authors of ‘Why Women Have Sex’, Cindy Meston and David Bus, psychologists from the University of Texas consider motivation ranging from altruistic sex ("I felt sorry for the guy") to revengeful sex ("I wanted to get back at my partner") to palliative sex ("I had a migraine"). It is heard from women who've had sex to boost their confidence, even if it's with a man (or woman) they find repulsive, and from those who've used sex to barter for gifts or household chores (9 percent of women have used this form of economic sex, according to a University of Michigan study)

Along with work side, many career oriented women have settled life. They manage their home and work efficiently. 60% of US women work outside the home, earning $1 trillion each year in aggregate. Of working married women, 48% provide half or more of the household income. 31 percent of the marriages where women work, women now out-earn their husbands. They are the primary bread winner.

In spite of all this hardship, struggle, battles, fight for equality women have come up as a influential entity. She pulls off all her roles justly without neglecting any. Yet, her difficulties never fail her. She still stands up as beautiful as any flower. She carries herself in the latest fashion, her hair will always be right, her make-up still at its best, her accessories never left out, her shoes so perfect and it is true that no man can ever be in her shoe. She can never be a different species but a higher of them. The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears the figure she carries or the way she combs her hair. The beauty of a woman must be seen from her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides. The true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul. It is the caring that she lovingly gives, the passion that she shows, the beauty of a woman with passing years-only grows.

“However, I'm not denyin' the women are foolish: God Almighty made 'em to match the men.” ~George Eliot

The Infamous Debate

Thesis: The function of literature is to delight or to edify.

The function of literature whether to instruct or to delight has been a famous debate. The debate that was commenced by Plato and Aristotle in the 4^th century B.C. has been carried forward by numerous critics over centuries. For some, literature is delight while for some others it is to instruct. However, according to DeQuincey (19^th century essayist) there is the literature of knowledge and the literature of power. Literature of knowledge instructs, preaches and understands. Literature of power is aesthetic and perceptive. For him, the concept of literature is informative and instructive, it is also delightful and it transports pleasure. At the same time it is true and sound.

For Plato, literature is merely a mode of instruction. He accuses art of being an imitation and it is twice removed from reality. He claims the subject and the methods to be false. Literature that is emotive seduces the philosopher. Only that literature which instructs is acceptable to Plato. However, Aristotle in his ‘Poetics’ refutes these accusations of Plato. He consents with Plato about literature being imitation but rebuts and affirms that imitation is natural. Plato’s ideal reality is higher reality for Aristotle. Literature being emotive is a cathartic process. Therefore, he defends literature and art as being a delightful way of thinking.

Every century has witnessed the practitioners of art debating this issue. They favor one or the other function. For Horace, the purpose of literature is “to instruct and to delight”. Longinus, a Latin critic believed that the function of literature is to transport, to elevate and ultimately to reach the sublime. This first ‘Affective Theory’ is attributed to Longinus. For the subject to transport, the poet’s personality is very crucial. The poet has to be a combination of vehemence of emotions and strong personality. Then the poetry can be affective.

In Sir Philip Sydney’s ‘An Apology for Poetrie’ he stresses on moral influence and states that the “delightful teaching is end of all poesy.” He was compelled to stress on the teaching aspect since he was responding to the Puritanical objections regarding the pleasures of literature. Ben Jonson, a 17^th century poet-dramatist and critic gave magnitude to self expression. For him, the words and the senses are the body and soul of poetry. He stresses on the delightful feature of art and literature. Similarly, John Dryden, a 17^th century essayist, critic, poet and a dramatist considers poetry as a representation of human nature and humours in delightful and instructive ways. He accentuates on the delight of poetry and says that instruction is second to delight.

There are critics who try to strike poise between both of these functions of literature. Like Dryden, Dr. Samuel Johnson, he too supposes that the end of all writing is to instruct while the end of all poetry is to instruct by pleasing. He also believes that the poet deals with species and not individuals and hence imparts general and transcendent truths.

For Romantics, literature was imagination, inspiration, expression of personality and they gave a lot of importance to the poet’s personal impression of life. Shelley, in his ‘Defense of Poesy’ integrates Platonic and Aristotlean ideas when he states that poetry is an “image of life expresses in its eternal truth.” In the Victorian Age, Matthew Arnold in ‘Essays in Criticism’, his essay ‘The study of Poetry’ says that “poetry is essential to interpret life for us, to control us, to sustain us.”

It is apparent how the practitioners and critics have takes sides over the debate. The primary function of literature for me is delight that ultimately leads to teaching. To delight and to instruct go hand in hand. Neither survives without the other. The age old fairy tales and fables serve the same purpose of being delightful and also impart morals and discipline. However interesting a piece of literature is, ultimately delivers instructions. In the process, teaching becomes a secondary function.

A piece of literature that simply amuses is not regarded as great literature, it is pulp fiction. Some examples of pulp writing are, ‘I Married a Dead Man’, ‘The Lolita Lovers’, ‘Kiss Me You Fool’. Such writings cannot be considered as literature at all. Literature is associated with imagination; however, teaching is a part of it. Literature that only functions as teaching or instruction is didactic. There is no imagination therefore; it is not great literature either. If it is only about teaching humanity, a book of sermon serves the same purpose but, can it be considered literature? Literature just as delight or literature as instruction cannot be observed in seclusion. There is no need to rule out either. Literature can do both as serve both its functions proficiently.

A great piece of literature is scrutinized by all when it is delightful and instructive, both. All great writers of the canons like Shakespeare, Dickens, Oscar Wilde and many more have revealed how literature can be both. All the imaginative literature is delightful and it is artistic in nature. Teaching takes place circuitously. This aesthetic aspect provides beauty to the work and also stirs up the emotions amongst the readers. This ultimately leads to catharsis.

Literature has had to defend itself pertaining to its functions and writers have felt coerced to prove that they were not merely delighting but also instructing humanity. All art is ‘sweet’ and ‘useful’ to its appropriate users. It articulates a higher truth than the readers are capable of. It gives better expression to their thoughts and offers a release through such an experience. A successful work of literature, therefore, coalesces pleasure and utility. The pleasure of literature is the higher one because it is non-acquisitive and reflective thus involving a higher activity. Its seriousness is aesthetic and it is one of perception, not of duty. The pleasure is not a frivolous one. Literature has many functions; therefore, it can supersede religion and philosophy that is mere instruction. It has many functions and it fuses several elements of history, music, imagery, poetry and so on. Therefore, literature is inestimable and enchanting, alluring to both mind and heart.

Growing Up - A Phenomena of Chastity and Sins

Childhood is a promise that is never kept. ~Ken Hill

It is funny, how often we retreat back to our childhood memories. Every step that we take to adulthood is haunted by the reminiscences of the past. Somehow, we do recuperate our interest in those colourful toys, those pictured story books, those old tattered soft toys and the best of all the moment capturing photos.

If I had a time-turner and I could travel back in time, I would love to re-live my childhood days. What can be more splendid and memorable than one’s own childhood! Those care-free days, the hastiness, being a liberated bird what more can a peson want? There is no one to yoke you with errands, no one to arbitrate your actions, clothes and tongue for that matter. You are exempted because you are a kid. Isn’t that amazing?

You can run around your house half naked and blemish your siblings’ apparel. You can jump on the bed and sofa and topple over your father’s stomach. You can make your mother sprint around you just to get you garbed. You can talk and play hysterically with your friends. You get the opportunity of choosing whatever you want because no one wants to see your innocent little face in tears. And still, if you don’t get what you want, you can yell out your lungs. You will get what you covet.

Yes, it is true that man is surrounded in the gummy cycle of money. Man holds no magnitude of his values learnt in his childhood. Every dive he makes, every memory he overlooks. The swift and hectic life, this rat racing for wealth has shook-off the joy of mankind. Becoming mere marionettes at the hands of our desires, we shed every clothes of our happiness. Being naked of our values, we run amuck in this crowded life. When you die, nobody ever buries you with money that you earned. It is the respect that you take to your grave. Money buys you no respect or love. Yet, can we still seek for that happiness that we consider the money can provide us?

It is said that the ‘simplest things are often truest’. What can be more simple and true like one’s own childhood? On the contrary, money complicates your life. The cardinal sin of greed and anger plays its role. It makes you more lusty and gluttonous for money. The more money you acquire, more prideful you become. Money strains your relations with your loved ones, which eventually brings you, sorrow and despair. It precincts you and limits your potentials. Money commits all the seven cardinal sins and drives you away from you cardinal virtues. You lose your humility, kindness, patience, diligence, charity, temperance and chaste virtues after being sinned by desirable money. Money acts like a lusty woman who drugs you till you become an addict. It drives out the pure, spiritual realm of childhood and condemns your purity. It is only after the childhood you grow up, you become an adult and you are sucked in by the complexities of the world.

It is true love cannot buy you a house. It can’t deliver the money to travel across the globe. It won’t buy you food for your family. It won’t cover your body to save you from the brute weather. Yet, it provides you something what wealth cannot. It brings you not a house but a home. With love, you can travel the journey of life. It provides you peace and content. It also provides you all the warmth you need.

Love in the purest form is experienced in your childhood. Your mother shouts at you for being sloppy, only because she loves you. Your father might have slapped you for even losing a single mark, it’s only because he wants the best out of you. Your siblings might have taken away what was yours, but that only teaches you forbearance. Your grandparents would take you in their arms and put you to sleep, rock you to bed and sing you a lullaby. Your mother won’t falter to run to you to catch you when you fall and kiss you sweetly while you cry. Your father won’t stop himself to buy you what you want and hug you tightly while you tremble. Under the umbrella of love and care your childhood is preserved.

The joy of childhood lies in the minuscule things. Observing a little pup by the road, having candy floss, ice popsicle, toffee given to you by your neighbours or even the one act play with your toys brings immense of joy. Collecting little flowers by the road and presenting it to your mother, making shabby greeting cards for your father during festivals, singing sweet song of innocence brings the most joyous moment to all. Little things hold greatest value; it means the world to you right then and there. Today, when you are all grown up, when you present brand new phone to your child he may lose it the next day and demand more. Today, you may want a new phone, then a new car, a new house…how restless is your demands, yet, you are unhappy. When the only one colour dominates your life, the colourful past begins to fade. The meaning of happiness, joy, love, and care is demeaned with money as a centre of attraction.

However, as a grown up, I, too, am fascinated to money as a means of life. It irks me to be pulled by my wishes on one side and my memories of the past. It’s a wish to replenish this void of my heart to be enriched with the joy of childhood memories. The sweet fruits are borne in the spring.

“There is a garden in every childhood, an enchanted place where colors are brighter, the air softer, and the morning more fragrant than ever again.”

- Elizabeth Lawrence

However, the spring of my life, those youthful days have passed by. What lives now, are just the reminiscences. Life still can be led with an optimist view. We never disregard what is truly felt or touched. It is factual, money is a malady but the cure is the memories of the past that dwells and grows better like an old wine.