Paramours and Concubines

Not an Adult-only Subject

An interesting thing came to my mind, when i was reading a short story by Kamala Das, a famous South Indian writer, who wrote both in Malayalam in the soubriquet, Madhavikutty, and in English. The name of the story is 'That Woman', a very small story running only to one and a half pages. The thing that struck me was why not have a say about concubines and illicit lovers also illicit wives of people. The story took me to a far-off place McLean, Virginia, where lives the royal descendent Eleanor Hermon, who published a very beautiful and much researched book SEX WITH KINGS. Titilating title, isn't it. As a matter of fact the book did not deal with how kings had sex and not even about postures and alluring costumes (or costumes-less). The book deals with poignant stories of famous courtesans and concubines of kings. Due to several political reasons, kings were often forced to marry princesses of neighbouring kingdoms. One can enjoy reading Shakespeare's Henry V's, in it the king marries the French princess to bring reconciliation between warring French and English armies, scenes of hilarity involving the conversation between Henry V and his newly wedded princess, who does not know English and the king does not know French and they both make love in bed-room with an interpreter. In this case it had a positive effect.

Kings needed not a physical companion but an intellectual consort who could give solace to the exhausted king, who comes after a lot of mental stress, that he is subjected to in his parlor. Herman makes use of the marriage between King Charles and Diana and Charles' association with Kameela Parker. If beauty is taken into account Kameela is no match to Diana (according to Herman), but still there is something more than outward appearance that makes people fall for concubines. SEX WITH KINGS deals also with what happens to those concubines as they lose their beauty due to old age, or they lose their position on the sudden demise of their lover-king, as they usually incur a lot of wrath from the legal, crown-queens. In the book Herman notes down sorry tales of those concubines who have been driven out of kingdoms, berated at and even jostled up or sometimes even burnt alive. There is also reference about some people turning to churches and prayer-houses for help by becoming nuns and spend their remaining lives doing service to humanity to make amends for their life as paramours.

Kamala Das' 'That Woman' is an Indian representation of such an angle. It has the first person narration and the gender of the narrator is not revealed to the readers. The forcible utterance of words and the exhibition of anger may make people come to a conclusion that the narrator must be a young man. The narrator's father left the family to live with another woman. The news of his death was reported to the family through a barber. No sooner the narrator's mother did listen to the news than she swooned, probably an inherent, unexhibited love for a ditcher finding an outlet in this fashion. The immediate reaction of the narrator was to reach the place of the other woman's and secure from her any will or testament, had the father left any in her. The person sounded cruel in treating the father's concubine. She was much upset and in tears bereaving her husband (too). The narrator gave only thirty minutes to her to leave and she obeyed without taking anything from home. Her reaction even moved the narrator who expected her to turn once again to see the corpse for the last time, while she was on the corner of the street. The story ends there but it makes the readers emotional as there is none to support the woman, who, though a prostitute, to the first and legal wife, was also loved by the dead soul, and she had nowhere to go, as she revealed that in the form of question put to the corpse.