" Betrayal" -Sivasankari in English

Sivasankari, a very popular Tamil writer, has brought out a collection of her stories translated into english. Her stories used to appear regularly in all tamil magazines once ; her writing was considered modern, feminist and introspective. I think it was she who brought the word " manushi" into popular tamil writing and it was adopted by others like Indumati, Vaasanthi and Anuradha Ramanan. Now- a- days, we dont see Sivasankari writing in any magazine.
This collection called " Betrayal and other stories" contains stories written many years ago for magazines- hence they all seem familiar and like a revision, so no novelty. The moralising tone prevalent 25 years ago sounds rather uncomfortable today. In the title story, a woman who has endured a casanova of a husband for more than 20 years, gets him married to a young but crude girl and kicks them out of her house. Revenge ? I dont get the point.

The collection also has three witty tales based on keenly observed everyday occurances that are a pleasure to read. The translation has retained the flavour of the south indian idiom.
VS