A Kitchen in the Corner of the House
India

A Kitchen in the Corner of the House

by Ambai (C.S. Lakshmi)

Freedom & Resistance Short Stories 2019

Summary

In this rich collection of short stories, Ambai explores the lives of women navigating the competing demands of family, tradition, love, and personal freedom in India. Moving between domestic spaces and wider social worlds, her characters include wives questioning their marriages, mothers negotiating the bonds between generations, and women discovering possibilities beyond the roles society has assigned them. The kitchen in the title story becomes a powerful symbol of women’s lives: a space associated with domestic labour and confinement, yet also one where women exercise influence, preserve traditions, and create their own forms of power. Through fragmented narratives, letters, memories, and mythological references, Ambai captures the contradictions of womanhood with warmth, humour, and quiet rebellion. Her stories challenge the assumption that liberation must mean rejecting one’s roots, instead revealing how women can reshape their worlds while remaining connected to their histories, relationships, and cultural identities.

Reviews

Login to leave a review.

No reviews yet. Be the first!

You might also like

A History of Burning
A History of Burning
Janika Oza
A Thread of Light
A Thread of Light
Neema Shah
The Strangling Fig
The Strangling Fig
Fauzia Musa
The Story Hour
The Story Hour
Thrity Umrigar
Country
India
Asia
About the author
Ambai (C.S. Lakshmi)
Ambai (C.S. Lakshmi)

Ambai is the pen name of C. S. Lakshmi (born 1944), an influential Tamil writer, feminist scholar, and researcher from India. Her fiction explores women’s experiences, examining the tensions between personal independence and social expectations, as well as the complexities of love, sexuality, family, and cultural identity. Known for her experimental storytelling, lyrical prose, and attention to the details of everyday life, she often gives voice to women whose desires and frustrations are overlooked in conventional narratives. Alongside her literary career, Ambai has researched the representation of women in Indian literature. In 1988, she founded SPARROW—the Sound and Picture Archives for Research on Women—a Mumbai-based organisation dedicated to documenting and preserving women’s lives and creative work. Her notable collections include In a Forest, a Deer and A Meeting on the Andheri Overbridge. She received India’s Sahitya Akademi Award in 2021 for her Tamil short-story collection Sivappu Kazhuthudan Oru Pachai Paravai.

View author page
Details
Published
2019
Author
Ambai (C.S. Lakshmi)