Paper Details

Name: Yumnam Leina Devi & Sangeeta Handa
Country: India

Year: 2026
Volume: Volume No: 13, Issue No: 1 (January-June)
Page Number: 215-223
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21428370

ABSTRACT
Jaishree Misra is an Indian author well known and established for her novels that explores themes of family, love, social issues and also women’s journey to empowerment.She is a modern novelist who is comparatively a new entry in the list of women writers of India. Most of her novels deal with woman’s journey from a subjugated female to an emancipated woman, who gathers courage to break the existing and traditional boundaries and emerge empowered and self-confident, able to navigate life’s journey bravely. The prime focus of Misra’s ouvre has been struggles of women. The present paper “A Woman’s Journey: Reading Jaishree Misra’s Ancient Promises is a part of the research project:“Reinventing Feminine Subjectivity : A Feminist Reading of Selected Fiction of Jaishree Misra, Anita Nair and Arundhati Roy. Most of Misra’s novels depict submissive and meek female characters like Janu in Ancient Promises, Maya in her novel Afterwards and Manikarnika ( in her teenage) in Rani and Neha and Sonya in A Scandalous Secret. Initially, almost all these prime female characters of her novels are comfortable in their submissive role to the male characters of their lives - love,father or husband. But , gradually the bitter experiences of their lives embedded them to throw away the mantle of submissive role and have the skill of establishing their individuality and enhance their own self-worth and also gather courage to start their life afresh. This enables these females to break away from the stereotypical roles and emerge as ‘new woman’ who become adept in making decisions and prioritise their happiness. The present paper has taken up only one of the text namely Ancient Promises to show a woman’s journey to empowerment and liberation. To establish woman’s journey to liberation and emancipation, certain theoretical concepts of Feminist theory have been used and appropriated form.Feminism is one such theory that involves women emancipating themselves on their own terms from discrimination, injustice and inequalities based on gender.Feminist ideology or philosophy,broadly speaking addresses orthodox patriarchal practices and customs that bound within male- dominated society. The prime aim of feminist philosophy is to put an end to the subordination and injustice and violence against women by enabling them to at least come at par with their male counterparts and gain more control of their own lives.

Keywords: Patriarchy, Feminism, Women Empowerment, Female Subjectivity.