Novel set in Madras, in the second half of the 20th Century

8th December 2018

The Last Devadasi by Barbara L Baer, novel set in Madras in the second half of the 20th Century.

In the shade of Ahmed Jamal’s awning, Jules Van Steen stroked a length of burnt orange raw silk. He raised his eyes from the glowing fabric to watch coolie women drive their bony cattle ahead of them, barely breaking the rhythm of their stride to pick up the wet cow droppings, slap them into pancakes and press them to dry on the crumbling sidewalk. He admired the upright posture of the women who hadn’t an ounce of fat on their bodies, and the confident way they’d tied their faded red saris up high between their legs to be able to stride freely while swinging their hips with distinctive womanly motions.

http://www.kalyanikalamandir.com/blogs/devdasi/

The Last Devadasi opens in January 1957 as a typhoon strikes the coastal town of Pondicherry, a French protectorate in Madras State; there, on the doorstep of the convent, a baby girl is discovered and named Celestine Marie. The novel then moves forward to 1975 where a starlet and dancer, Kamala Kumari, is filming at Gemini Studios in the city of Madras. The third ‘actor’, Jules Van Steen, a silk merchant and former lover of Kamala Kumari, gets in his usual trouble in the dangerous port area of Georgetown.

http://www.kalyanikalamandir.com/blogs/devdasi/

Barbara L Baer says that she wrote The Last Devadasi over several decades from memory and journal entries that she kept during her three years living in South India. Where she needed to add to the places, people, music, street noises and smells she remembered, she did research but in excerpts throughout this post, a trio of interconnected characters evoke the Madras she knew long before it was renamed Chennai.

In the shade of Ahmed Jamal’s awning, Jules Van Steen stroked a length of burnt orange raw silk. He raised his eyes from the glowing fabric to watch coolie women drive their bony cattle ahead of them, barely breaking the rhythm of their stride to pick up the wet cow droppings, slap them into pancakes and press them to dry on the crumbling sidewalk. He admired the upright posture of the women who hadn’t an ounce of fat on their bodies, and the confident way they’d tied their faded red saris up high between their legs to be able to stride freely while swinging their hips with distinctive womanly motions.

Book Review:

The author is clearly fascinated by the Devadasi culture, women who are “wedded to God because they are the sacred dancers who alone perform a most important divine commission in [our} temples. They dance and sing and serve rice to Siva“. Originally they had a very high status in Indian culture, but the system has been outlawed since 1988 (according to Wikipedia).

Kamala is now a Bollywood actress and comes from devadasi lineage. She has been in a relationship with Dutchman Jules, who is actually married to frail Angela who wants to learn to dance. Celeste (formerly Celestine Marie), who was raised in the orphanage in Pondicherry, is a link between the characters.

There is quite a cinematic quality to the book, and what the author does extremely well is conjure up the feel of the country in the second half of the 20th Century. The culture, sights, FOOD (green mango sprinkled with pepper powder!), and mores that are prevalent at the time all feature strongly in her writing. At the end there is a quick synopsis – much like at the end of a film – detailing the fate of the main characters.

The story is like a stream of consciousness and explores a variety of themes…

The nature of the devadasi culture is central to the novel and is explored through the eyes of different characters. Male angst about monogamy and a prurient curiosity about the lives of the devadasi seems rife (one extramarital fling left a character tartly noting of his sexual partner that “..her pink private parts…looked like a dessert jelly” Yes, well…).  Books are clearly dear to the author with plenty of references to Higginbotham & Co, founded by a stowaway librarian in 1840 – there are many stores still dotted around India today. The French dimension adds colour and permeates the storyline, adding extra flair. Colonial issues are addressed as Angela (Jules’s wife) tries to integrate with other Western women. Bollywood comes under scrutiny as Kamala makes her way in the industry. And dance, in a variety of forms, is clearly one of the author’s passions. Religions – both Christian and Hindu – are recurring themes, as well as the wealth of language (often the reader can hear the native Indian speaking English with an Indian accent).

Thus, there are themes aplenty and sometimes they take precedence in the construct. The writing is very competent and impassioned. Overall, however, I found it hard to identify with any of the characters, they just passed across the pages, and the story had a sliding quality, an exuberance of description that tipped the book into a storyline that told more than it showed. And this, for me, ultimately fractured a potentially cohesive and engaging storyline.

In the shade of Ahmed Jamal’s awning, Jules Van Steen stroked a length of burnt orange raw silk. He raised his eyes from the glowing fabric to watch coolie women drive their bony cattle ahead of them, barely breaking the rhythm of their stride to pick up the wet cow droppings, slap them into pancakes and press them to dry on the crumbling sidewalk. He admired the upright posture of the women who hadn’t an ounce of fat on their bodies, and the confident way they’d tied their faded red saris up high between their legs to be able to stride freely while swinging their hips with distinctive womanly motions.

Tina for the TripFiction Team

You can connect with Barbara via her website She is not currently active on Social Media.

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