Asia Pacific Journal of Research
Vol: I Issue XXI, January 2015
ISSN: 2320-5504, E-ISSN-2347-4793
HOPE TO THE LAST – A STUDY OF KAMALA MARKANDAYA’S NECTAR IN A SIEVE
DR.S.Karthikkumar
V.K.Venkatalakshmi
Assistant Professor
Ph.D Research Scholar (Ext)
Department of English
Department of English
Annamalai University
Annamalai University
Annamalainagar
Annamalainagar
“Some see a hopeless end, while
others see an endless hope” (Anonymous)
Rukmani, the protagonist narrator of Kamala Markandaya’sNectar in a Sieve, clings to hope in all her
adverse periods till the consummation of the novel. She can, as well, be called an incarnation of hope. So
powerful is the character of Rukmani, that the reader is awestruck at her portrayal in the deft hands of
Kamala Markandaya.
Since the dawn of Indian Independence, one has been witnessing that the predicament of Indian
women engages the attention of major Indian women novelists in English. Kamala Markandaya has earned
herself a pivotal place in the history of Indian English Literature, which is agog with several Women
writers. She has played a crucial role in the making of post-independence Indian English Fiction. As
M.K.Naik observes,
“Markandaya’s fiction evinces a much broader range and offers a greater variety of setting,
character and effect, though her quintessential themes are equally few – viz., the East-West
encounter, and woman in different life-roles. The East-West encounter takes two forms – first, a
direct relationship between Indian and British characters; and secondly, the impact of the modern
urban culture brought in by the British role on traditional Indian life.” (Naik)
Markandaya’s prime work, magnum opus as well, Nectar in a Sieve (1954) has, in it, all these
characteristics. Her other important works include: Some Inner Fury (1955), A Silence of Desire (1960),
A Handful of Rice (1966), The Coffer Dams (1969), The Nowhere Man (1972) and the longest work The
Golden Honeycomb (1977).
The subtitle of Nectar in a Sieve, “a novel of rural India” signifies its rural setting and characters.
The novel typifies the poor plight of rural peasants in the destructive hands of industrialization and
urbanization, which is made worse by the evil hands of nature – drought and floods. Markandaya takes us
to the kernel of a South Indian village which has not been disordered by modernity for so many years, but
industry and technology peep in, only to disrupt the peace and quiet of the poor peasants. Shiv K.Kumar
remarks,
“Kamala Markandaya’s novels attempt to present in symbolical characters and situations thus thrust
toward modernity, which often assumes in her work the guise of a malignant tumour infecting the
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Asia Pacific Journal of Research
Vol: I Issue XXI, January 2015
ISSN: 2320-5504, E-ISSN-2347-4793
vitals of a culture traditionally quietistic. It is this evil force that drives her rustic characters from
idyllic tranquillity to the disquieting pressure of city life.” (185)
K.R.SrinivasaIyengar opines, “Women are natural story tellers even when they don’t write or
publish” (73). Markandaya makes Rukmani, the narrator-heroine of the novel Nectar in a Sieve. Rukmani
carries the readers with her in a nostalgic journey, where the vagaries of the nature and the despoliation of
industrialization and urbanization tear her family apart. After her wedding with Nathan, she comes to live
in a mud hut in a village. She learns from her neighbour Kali that Nathan has built the hut all by himself.
When they are no longer strangers, Rukmani feels,
“While the sun shines on you and the fields are green and beautiful to the eye, and your husband
sees beauty in you, which no one has seen before, and you have a good store of grain aid away for
hard times, a roof over you and a sweet stirring in your body, what more can a woman ask for?”
(Markandaya)
With undeterred hope, Rukmani carries on with her earlier days of wedding in all its fervour. She gets to
know of the neighbours, Kali, Janaki, and Kunthi with a hope that they may get on well with her, only to be
betrayed by them later by various means. Rukmani plants pumpkins, beans, sweet potatoes, brinjals and
chillies. They “all grew well under my hand” (Markandaya).
Fear and Hunger are two constant companions of the poor peasants, particularly when monsoon
fails or it is furious. “The real cause of hunger is the powerlessness of the poor to gain access to the
resources they need to feed themselves” (Lappe). Rukmani and Nathan pin their hopes on the land, which
fails them leaving them with cataclysmic effects. Their only daughter Ira, after being termed “barren” by
her husband, returns to her parents. To save the youngest child of Rukmani from dying, Ira takes to
prostitution. One of Rukmani’s sons, Raja is killed by the security of the tannery. Her other sons, Arjun and
Thambi join tannery, and subsequently they leave the village for greener pastures. Selvam is assisting
Dr.Kennington (fondly called Kenny) in the construction of the hospital in the village. Nathan gets the final
and massive blow, when they are asked to leave the land. This is too much for Nathan to bear. Rukmani
and Nathan leave for the city in pursuit of their son, Murugan, only to find out that his son has abandoned
his wife and children. In a precarious state, Nathan and Rukmani become stone-breakers in a quarry,
assisted by an abandoned child Puli. When they have saved enough money to return to their village, Nathan
dies in a decrepit state, leaving Rukmani despondent. Rukmani returns to the village with their adopted son
Puli, to live with Selvam and Ira.
In her book Apprenticed to Hope: A Sourcebook for Difficult Times, Julie Neraas, discusses
several kinds of hope. They are:
1. Inborn Hope
2. Chosen Hope
3. Borrowed Hope
4. Bargainer’s Hope
5. Unrealistic Hope
6. Mature Hope
One can find all these hopes contrived by Rukmani and Nathan in Nectar in a Sieve. Right from her
tender age, Rukmani has come to believe that her marriage will take place in all its grandeur just like her
sisters’. The hope gets shattered when she learns that her father is no longer affluent enough to spend for
her marriage. “Four dowries is too much for a man to bear.”(Markandaya). All that remains is a diamond
nose-screw. She is given in marriage to a tenant farmer, Nathan. He is bereft of riches, of course, but not
love and affection for his beloved wife. On their way home after wedding, Nathan calms her, “Do not fret.
Come, dry your eyes and sit up here beside me.” When they reach home, Rukmani is almost in tears seeing
the mud hut. Noticing this, Nathan, filled with concern, holds her. Rukmani assures,
“It is nothing,” I said. “I am tired – no more. I will be allright in a minute” (Markandaya).
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Asia Pacific Journal of Research
Vol: I Issue XXI, January 2015
ISSN: 2320-5504, E-ISSN-2347-4793
From this point, Rukmani, till the end of the novel, takes diligent care of their life. There is an Inborn
Hope in Rukmani to face all the shackles of life.
“Chosen Hope is a life stance” (Neraas). Even if things do not look good for the moment, if one
sticks to hope, then it is Chosen Hope. In this novel, Rukmani sets about her life with a mark of hope.
Nathan does not own the land, still there is a possibility that one day he may do so. In the hope of owning
the land, Rukmani and Nathan save in their gunny sacks stored in a granary. In their opulent period, when
they are only two to feed, they have rice, dahl, coconut cooked in milk and sugar, wheatcake fried in butter.
Rukmani is aware of the fact that when they have too many mouths to feed, they will not have enough to
eat. When industrialization sets in the village in the form of tannery, Rukmani still hopes that the people of
tannery, will, some day, leave and never come back . Nathan says, “There is no going back. Bend like the
grass, that you do not break”. (Markandaya). When Arjun and Thambi leave for Ceylon to work in tea
plantations, Rukmani knows very well that she will never see them again, nevertheless, she hopes that they
will come back someday (which does not happen).
Rukmani, even is a hope incarnate, at times, borrows hope from her mother and Nathan in her
period of distress. This is Borrowed Hope. In this novel, after the birth of Irawaddy, the eldest daughter,
Rukmani remains childless for six long years with no hope of begetting sons. When Rukmani’s mother has
one foot in the grave, she gives Rukmani, a small Lingam, a symbol of fertility. “Wear it ....You will yet
bear many sons. I see them, and what the dying see will come to pass..... be assured, this is no illusion”
(Markandaya). When Murugan decides to go to city to be a servant to Dr. Birla, Rukmani is in utter
distress. Nathan pacifies her.
“You brood too much,” Nathan said, “and think only of your trials, not of the joys that are still with
us. Look at our land – is it not beautiful? The fields are green and the grain is ripening. It will be a
good harvest year, there will be plenty.” (Markandaya)
As fate would have it, the rains failed that year. Nathan says, “Perhaps tomorrow.....it is not too
late”(Markandaya) When Rukmani and Nathan get older, with no one to assist them, Rukmani is worried
how to manage reaping, threshing and winnowing, when the time comes. Nathan says with confidence,
“You will see.......We will find our strength. One look at the swelling grain will be enough to renew our
vigour” (Markandaya).
“When a daunting challenge or crisis crashes into our life, we can take a bargainer’s position.”
(Neraas) This is Bargainer’s Hope. In Nectar in a Sievewhen the monsoon fails, when Rukmani and
Nathan have too little to harvest, they take pumpkin and some grains and place it before the Goddess and
pray for a good harvest next time. They place all their hopes on land anticipating that the land will give
them bountiful. So, they toil all day in sun and rain in the land. When the monsoon fails them, they cannot
pay the Zamindar his dues. Rukmani and Nathan are told that if they cannot make the payment, the land
will be given to another. Nathan bargains that until the next crop, he must be given time. Sivaji, the rentcollector asks them to pay half the due and leaves quickly. Rukmani and Nathan have to sell everything
including Rukmani’s wedding saree. All they do, just in the hope of clinging to the land.
Another kind of hope is Unrealistic Hope. This is ubiquitous in the entire novel, Nectar in a Sieve.
Throughout the novel, Rukmani experiences blow after blow, with no indication that the state of affairs
will improve. Still, there is “Hope to the last”, as Dickens says in Nicholas Nickleby. Rukmani endures the
hardships of life with quiet fortitude. There is a series of hope on which the novel is constructed, only to
find them shattered. Nathan wants, “a son to continue his line and walk beside him on the land, not a puling
infant who would take with her a dowry and leave nothing but a memory behind” (Markandaya). Destiny
has designed it otherwise. It is only his sons who leave memories behind and not Ira, to whom Rukmani
returns to live with.
With six children to feed, Rukmani and Nathan go short of many things. Milk is given only to the
youngest child. They live on rice and dahl. Day after day, Rukmani lives on hope after hope. Nature
deceives them in a singular manner. Either the village faces drought or is in floods.
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Asia Pacific Journal of Research
Vol: I Issue XXI, January 2015
ISSN: 2320-5504, E-ISSN-2347-4793
“Hope and fear. Twin forces that tugged at us first in one direction and then in another, and which
was the stronger no one could say. .... Fear, constant companion of the peasant.Hunger, ever at his
elbow to jog his elbow, should he relax.Despair, ready to engulf him, should he falter. Fear; fear of
the dark future; fear of the sharpness of hunger; fear of the blackness of the death” (Markandaya)
In their extreme indigence, they feed on whatever they can find – soft ripe fruit of the prickly pear, a sweet
potato, blackened and half-rotten, thrown away by some prosperous hand, a crab, some bamboo shoots,
grass, a piece of coconut picked from the gutter. All their hopes of getting rains turn unrealistic when
monsoon fails. Ira takes to prostitution to feed the youngest child of the family, Kuti. All her efforts go
waste, when he becomes the victim of poverty and hunger.
Industrialization places its destructive hands in the so far tranquil village in the form of tannery.
Rukmani hopes that the people of tannery will go back and never return. Much against the wishes of their
parents, Arjun and Thambi join the tannery to earn their living. The joy is only short-lived. When they ask
for better wages, they are replaced. Her other son, Raja is attacked ruthlessly by the security of the tannery,
resulting in his death. Selvam works in the construction of the hospital, initiated by Dr.Kenny. Murugan
has gone to work in the city to work for Dr. Birla, as recommended by Dr.Kenny. Then comes the heaviest
blow of their lives when the Zamindar asks them to leave the land, since it has been taken over by the
tannery people. “In our lives there is no margin for misfortune. Still, while there was land there was hope”
(Markandaya). When Rukmani and Nathan have nothing to hold on, they decide to go to Murugan, with the
hope that he “will welcome his parents”. On reaching the city, they are appalled at the “deafening
bewildering clamour”. The temple, which promises food and shelter, inveigles them. The couple loses their
“untended” bundles and silver coins, when Rukmani is busy getting the food provided in the temple.
“What, even in a temple! We did not think----” “Yes, even in a temple, of course. Many kinds come
here, there can be no guarantee of their honesty” (Markandaya)
The hope becomes unrealistic when they find out that Murugan has deserted his family. “But we had been
so sure he would be here, we had relied on it, it had never struck us that he would leave without telling us”
(Markandaya).
“Mature hope is based on meaning. In other words, things are worthwhile regardless of how they
turn out.” (Neraas) Rukmani has unstinted hope on Nathan, even after she learns that Nathan is the father
of Kunthi’s sons - “while her husband in his impotence and I in my innocence did nothing” (Markandaya).
Rukmani’s relationship with Dr.Kenny is very cordial. She calls him her “benefactor”. She puts up with the
doctor at times when he loses his temper, for instance, when Kenny calls the ignorant and innocent
villagers, “Acquiescent imbeciles”. Rukmani has matured hopes on Kenny.
Ira loses hope of her husband taking her back. When Kuti, the youngest child of Rukmani is born,
Ira, with renewed vigour, takes good care of him. She goes to the extent of taking to prostitution, (of which
she begets, Sacrabani, an albino) to feed the child. Rukmani keeps her calm. “Well, we let her go. We had
tried everything in our power” (Markandaya). Rukmani has only remote hope of Kuti surviving the hunger
“Kuti might not live to see the harvesting”. When the land is seized away from them, Rukmani handles it in
a matured way, “Tannery or not, the land might have been taken from us. It had never belonged to us”,
Rukmani quite honestly concedes.
Rukmani is optimistic of their better living in the city with their son Murugan. When it turns topsyturvy, the couple decide to go back to their village. “We had left because we had nothing to live on, and if
we went back it was only because there was nothing here either.” Rukmani sets herself up as a reader and
writer of letters, of which she earns a pie or anna. Puli, an abandoned child, with leprosy, gives them a
helping hand by taking them to a quarry to earn their living by breaking stones. Rukmani feels a new
upsurge of hope in Puli. When they have earned enough money to return to their village, Nathan is caught
with the spasm of sickness, eventually leading to his demise, with an assurance that “You are not alone .... I
live in my children” (Markandaya).
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Asia Pacific Journal of Research
Vol: I Issue XXI, January 2015
ISSN: 2320-5504, E-ISSN-2347-4793
Rukmani decides to return to the village with Puli, her adopted son. In the short time, they have
become curiously dependent on the boy. Homecoming is very calm and composed for Rukmani, as she
always is, with Puli by her side. Selvam reiterates that, “Do not worry, we shall manage”. Of Nathan’s
death, Rukmani ponders, “It was a gentle passing. I will tell you later” (Markandaya)
“To Rukmani, it seems as if her hard work is for nothing, because the results of this hard work, the
nectar, always seem to disappear, as if through a sieve. Eventually, she always finds a glimmer of
hope.”
Thus, Markandaya, through the character of Rukmani, elucidates that for every individual, hope is requisite
in every condition of life, without which, dejection and depression, angst and anxiety, torment and torture,
will be insupportable.
REFERENCES:
1. Chathurvedi, Manju., Jaya Srivatsava. Critical Essays on Indian Writing in English. New Delhi:
Sarup Book Publishers Pvt. Ltd, 2014.
2. Garg, Neerja. Kamala Markandaya’s Vision of Life. New Delhi: Sarup& Sons, 2003.
3. Iyengar, Srinivasa K.R. Indian Writing in English. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1973.
4. Kumar, Satish. A Survey of Indian English Novel. Bareilly: Prakash Book Depot, 1996.
5. Markandaya, Kamala. Nectar in a Sieve. New York: Signet Classics, 2010.
6. Misra, Pravati. Class Consciousness in the Novels of Kamala Markandaya. New Delhi: Atlantic
Publishers and Distributors, 2001.
7. Naik, M.K. A History of Indian English Literature. New Delhi: SahityaAkademi, 2009.
8. Rao, Krishna A.V., K.MadhaviMenon. Kamala Markandaya: A Critical Study of Her Novels,
1954 – 1982. New Delhi: B.R.Publishing Corporation, [A Division of BRPC (India) Ltd.], 1997.
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