Othappu (The Scent of The Other Side)

Book Specification

Book Description

About the Book

Othappu is about a woman’s yearning for a true understanding of spirituality and her own sexuality. A powerful indictment of the hypocrisy that plagues Christianity in many parts of the Subcontinent, the novel unfolds at many levels to critique notions of class, caste, antiquity, and prestige.

With its strong social message, this novel will appeal to readers of all hues including students and scholars of Indian writing, comparative literature, and translation, cultural, and gender studies.

About the Author

Sarah Joseph is an acclaimed short-story writer and novelist, whose novels include Aalaahayude Penmakkal (1999), winner of both Central and Kerala Sahitya Akademi awards and the Vayalar Award; Maatatbi (2003), winner of the O. Chandumenon Award; Oorukaaval (2008), winner of the Basheer Award; and Aathi (2011).

Valson Thampu is Principal, St Stephen’s College, Delhi. A theologian, writer, and peace-activist, he has written extensively on spirituality and religion, politics, and socio-cultural issues.

Author’s Note

The desire to be a nun lingers in the flowering-time of every Catholic girl’s life. Without this desire, her teenage is not complete. ‘Piety’ is a haunting passion for a girl from an orthodox background. Surrounded by moral values strongly based on the teachings of family and religion, she wanders in a mysterious world of passion for Jesus Christ.

I too went through a teenage longing to be ‘one’ with Christ. I too hungered to burn like camphor spreading the fragrance of peace everywhere around me. I was in the vice-grip of a rnelancholy that only Christianity bestows. The fear of God and the fear of sin held me back from the temptations of teenage. Christ was bleeding inside me. Each minute passed me by with the memory of his countless bloodied wounds. I screamed silently. Whenever I was alone in a church, I thought, ‘One day I shall be a nun’. But I got no call from God.

My teenage, soaked in such ideals, thus passed by. Youth unleashed a hurricane in my senses. I didn’t wish to shut the door against the cravings of my body. Instead, I longed to get lost in the festivals of it. Adoring myself, I grew silently. But life led me through its ups and downs.

Life showed the way. Poor me, I had to follow.

When I was sixteen my parents gave me away in marriage-I had no choice. I knew little of a person’s spiritual and sexual life. I was caught between two forces called ‘sexuality’ and ‘spirituality’ without any opportunity to mix them. As a woman, I came to know my spirituality through the experiences of my body. My spiritual seeking spread through my desires, sorrows, ailments, labour, weariness, angst, and pleasure. No woman can view her pregnancy, delivery, and breast- feeding as something purely biological. For her, every month’s bloodshed is spiritual. The spirituality of a woman lies in the pleasures of sexual intercourse and in the pain of delivering a child.

A woman longs for a life of intimacy where the joys of mind and body might unite. The music of this mystical happiness transcends the mere passion of physicality, She grows numb when her man asks, ‘What else do you expect from me? Will you never, ever be happy?’ For a woman, sexuality is not a matter of physical or mechanical indulgence. It is absurd to categorize t