About this story
Outside, the partition of Bengal has filled the road with flags, and imported cloth burns in the courtyard. You play Bimala, choosing where to sit and whether to answer Sandip, who is already calling her the voice of the nation.
Who you’ll meet
Nikhil, the landowner husband the reader is married to, facing down Sandip, his magnetic political-rival friend, across their own hall.
How it opens
Your mother's red-bordered sari returned in memory whenever marriage asked what a good wife should be.
Within Nikhil's household, devotion felt safe until he questioned the walls protecting it.
Bimala, love offered only inside custom has never been allowed to test itself.
I want you to know the world before deciding that this home contains enough.
Sister-in-lawMen praise freedom most when they expect women to use it decoratively.
Choose
Home is not a prison merely because the world lies outside it.
You ask me to risk judgment that will fall only upon me.