The Henna Artist

Lakshmi’s life story examines the changing role of women in Indian society in the 1950s. She lives at a time when women’s independence is an uneasy notion for most. She begins her adventure by running away from an abusive husband. This action would be unthinkable to most Indian women of her generation, especially those from a rural background like hers. This is due to the collective sense of identity that pervades traditional culture, especially as it concerns women. As mothers and caretakers, women were seen to belong entirely to those in their families, including their parents, children, and husbands. Any personal choice that challenges one of those categories could ruin the entire family’s reputation.

Lakshmi compounds her rebellion by setting herself up in business and succeeding. Financial independence is yet another violation of Indian traditions, and though Lakshmi is independent, she isn’t immune to the psychological repercussions of stepping out of a traditional female role. She is overcome with guilt for turning her back on her parents. In effect, she is turning her back on her entire culture and seeks to make amends by building a fine new house for her family to expunge her shame.

Perhaps the greatest violation of the traditional female role is to claim ownership of one’s own body. As Lakshmi herself explicitly states at more than one point in the novel, a woman becomes her husband’s property: “But I also knew that as soon as I married, I would become jaaya—my husband taking birth in my womb in the form of future children. And once there were children, there would be no more I or me, only we and them” (162). Lakshmi decides to forgo motherhood, which is one of the foundational aspects of female identity in patriarchal societies. Women in such societies who do not have children are seen as violating the social order and are stigmatized if not outcast. Lakshmi knows what she is risking by leaving her husband, but her sense of self-preservation is too strong to submit to a situation she knows could destroy her.

Because she learned herbalism from her mother-in-law, Lakshmi knows how to prevent pregnancies as well as to encourage them. She has seen firsthand the physical and emotional toll that too many pregnancies can take on a woman. Her contraceptive sachets give women some control over when they conceive and when to avoid conception. Despite the fact that Samir buys these sachets of cotton root bark for his mistresses to avoid complications while pursuing his amorous activities, they still provide a safety measure for women whom society would otherwise label immoral. Lakshmi is thus able to share a limited measure of her hard-won independence with her fellow women.