One Part Woman - by Perumal Murugan (Paperback)

About the Book

Book Synopsis

The first book published in America by a world-class writer, already profiled by the New York Times, One Part Woman is a charming and touching story of a South Indian couple who cannot conceive, and the extraordinary lengths they go to please their family and try to have a baby.

Selling over 100,000 copies in India, where it was published first in the original Tamil and then in a celebrated translation by Penguin India, Perumal Murugan's One Part Woman has become a cult phenomenon in the subcontinent, captivating Indian readers and jump-starting conversations about caste and female empowerment. Set in South India during the British colonial period but with powerful resonance to the present day, One Part Woman tells the story of a couple, Kali and Ponna, who are unable to conceive, much to the concern of their families--and the crowing amusement of Kali's male friends. Kali and Ponna try anything to have a child, including making offerings at different temples, atoning for past misdeeds of dead family members, and even circumambulating a mountain supposed to cure barren women, but all to no avail.

A more radical plan is required, and the annual chariot festival, a celebration of the god Maadhorubaagan, who is one part woman, one part man, may provide the answer. On the eighteenth night of the festival, the festivities culminate in a carnival, and on that night the rules of marriage are suspended, and consensual sex between any man and woman is permitted. The festival may be the solution to Kali and Ponna's problem, but it soon threatens to drive the couple apart as much as to bring them together.

Wryly amusing, fable-like, and deeply poignant, One Part Woman is a powerful exploration of a loving marriage strained by the expectations of others, and an attack on the rigid rules of caste and tradition that continue to constrict opportunity and happiness today.

Review Quotes

Praise for One Part Woman:

LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN TRANSLATED LITERATURE

"Murugan works his themes with a light hand; they always emanate from his characters, who are endowed with enough contradiction and mystery to keep from devolving into mouthpieces . . . It's not just the physical world Murugan describes so vividly--the way a cow clears its throat, for example--but the rural community, a village of 20 huts and a thousand ancient resentments, where there is no privacy and your neighbor's suffering can serve as your evening's entertainment . . . I'm hoping for a whole shelf of books from this writer."--Parul Sehgal, New York Times

"Intimate and affecting . . . Throughout the novel, Murugan pits the individual against the group. How far you willing to go, he asks, in order to belong? . . . Murugan's descriptions of village life are evocative, but the true pleasure of this book lies in his adept explorations of male and female relationships, and in his unmistakable affection for people who find themselves pitted against the world."--Laila Lalami, New York Times Book Review

"This subtly subversive novel examines the pang of childlessness experienced by Kali and Ponna, a couple living in rural southern India. In simple yet lyrical prose, Murugan shows how their standing in the world depends on offspring . . . The novel considers the constraints of tradition and beautifully articulates the couple's intense connection, even without a child."--New Yorker

"Murugan's unsurpassed ability to capture Tamil speech lays bare the complex organism of the society he adeptly portrays . . . Aniruddhan Vasudevan's idiomatic translation preserves the mood of the original, and serves as a constant linguistic reminder that, as readers in English, we are but visitors to this realistic pre-independence Tamil world. For a book that earned its author death threats and was burned by mobs, One Part Woman is a surprisingly tranquil, sensuous read."--Guardian

"Perumal Murugan's fifth novel (longlisted for the National Book Award) follows a young couple who is unable to conceive. The book, which recalls Nigerian author Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀'s Stay with Me, adds a new perspective to the still taboo subject of conception, and explores the intricacies of parenthood as well as the pressures of tradition and stigma."--Vanity Fair

"Translated by Aniruddhan Vasudevan, this novel from the globally bestselling Murugan will give fans of South Asian fiction a new perspective and fans of excellent historical fiction a new read."--Literary Hub

"Beautiful . . . Plunges readers into Tamil culture through a story of love within a caste system undergoing British colonization in the early 19th century . . . Murugan's touching, harrowing love story captures the toll that infertility has on a marriage in a world where having a child is the greatest measure of one's worth."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"With a backstory as fascinating as the narrative, this intriguing work, longlisted for the National Book Award, will undoubtedly be appreciated by internationally savvy Anglophone audiences."--Library Journal

"Perumal Murugan brings a playful, fable-like quality to his tale of traditional values and their subversion."--Vanity Fair, "Fall's Best Books from Around the World"

"Perumal Murugan's

About the Author

Perumal Murugan is the star of contemporary Tamil literature. He has written ten novels and five collections each of short stories and poetry. His best-known novel One Part Woman was longlisted for the inaugural National Book Award for Translation, and it won the prestigious ILF Samanvay Bhasha Samman for writing in Indian languages and the Translation Prize from India's National Academy of Letters.

Aniruddhan Vasudevan is a performer, writer and translator. He documents various public health projects and art projects, and is involved in LGBT advocacy work. He is currently a PhD student in anthropology at the University of Texas, Austin, and is working on his first novel.