Fancy & Frustration in Jhabvala’s 'The Householders'

Indian English literature has developed over a period of time and writing in English did not start in a day. It took many years. Indian women novelists have given a new dimension to it. The study is based on the women’s basic problems of survival and existence which have discovered new ways to counter the various forms of oppression meted to women in a male dominated society. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, a world class fictionist and storyteller of the present century, has distinctive achievements as a literary artist. Jhabvala also chronicled a distinctive phase in encounters between Indians and Westerners, as a last generation of imperial Britons trickled away and new customs, new tastes, and new people (increasingly American) stepped in. She deals with the situation of breakdown of a traditional social order thereby highlighting the alienation or isolation between one individual and another in marital relations, in family life, in the society at large. The theme of fancy & frustration is compellingly dealt with her novel The Householder, wherein the women characters are central figures.