A DALIT FEMINIST READING OF THE EARLY SUBALTERN NOVELS IN MALAYALAM

Abstract

This paper intends to study the early subaltern novels in Malayalam- Mrs Frances Wright Collins’ Ghathakavadhom (1877), Arch Deacon Koshy’s Pullelikunju (1882), Potheri Kunjambu’s Saraswativijayam (1892) and Joseph Muliyil’s Sukumari (1897) - from a dalit feminist perspective. The attempt is to analyse the representation of the dalit female in such novels which were critical of the native tradition in general and the dalit question in particular. The study is rooted in assumption that the particular question is addressed only minimally in such works. But even this minimal representation, knowingly or unknowingly from the part of the novelists, is deemed significant in the backdrop of the strategic exclusion of dalit females from the domains of both mainstream history and canonical novels of the said period. The discourse concerning the minimal representation or even non-representation of dalit females in the select works will cast light on the hitherto unexplored dimensions of the early subaltern fiction in Malayalam.