A house without mirrors

A House Without Mirrors describes the life of one woman, Sivakami (1896-1966), and introduces us to an India we have never seen before. The Brahmin Sivakami is ten years old when she marries Hanumarathnam, an astrologer and healer. The stars say that he may die in the ninth year of his marriage. Everything depends on the horoscope of his children. The birth of Thangam, their golden daughter, changes nothing, but the birth of Vairum, their restless, intelligent son, seals the unthinkable: he condemns his father to death. Sivakami, eighteen and a widow, submits to the rules of her caste. She shaves her head, dresses in white and is not allowed to touch anyone from sunrise to sunset. However, she commits one act of resistance: she returns to her husband's house to raise her children in her own way and, with the help of the faithful Muchami, to manage the land for her son. No action is without consequences, and as politics and social revolutions clash with traditions, the gap between mother and son grows ever wider. My novel has its origins in the stories my grandmother told me about her grandmother. I was captivated by the emotional depth of the stories, by discovering my own 'prehistory' and by the need to record this rapidly disappearing world. Padma Viswanathan Padma Viswanathan is a journalist and (play)writer. Her plays and short stories have won several awards. A House Without Mirrors is based on the life of her grandmother's grandmother.