Power and intrigue in personal relations in Goa
A review of Ben Antao's "The Tailor's Daughter" by Cornel DaCosta
Because of a substantial academic background in sociology and education, I
have inevitably been drawn to issues relating to macro and micro power
relations in societies. One aspect of this interest has focused on the Hindu
caste system and how it has penetrated, to varied degrees, other religions
like Buddhism, Sikhism, Islam, and Roman Catholicism that essentially reject
the concept and practice of caste. Consequently, I have written extensively,
in cyberspace and elsewhere, about the significance of caste to caste
adherents among Roman Catholics in Goa. Their caste hegemony has been
effective for almost half a millennium, despite conversion to Catholicism in
the period of Portuguese colonialism and beyond in Goa.
The key emphasis in my writings has been that Roman Catholic and Hindu caste
beliefs are entirely incompatible as ideologies and religious belief systems
and cannot be sustained simultaneously by individuals. Furthermore, at root
there is no caste in Roman Catholicism. Notwithstanding this unassailable
argument, the Catholic Church in Goa has been hand in glove with caste for
generations. The existence of such hypocrisy is well known in the literature
and everyday life in Goa.
The novel, The Tailor's Daughter by Ben Antao, is largely about the enigma
of caste among those proclaiming to be Catholic practitioners in Goa. The
story is primarily one of entangled human emotions but at a deeper end there
is a profound exploration into the complexity of relationships between
people separated by proclaimed caste differences. In this scenario, the
dominant characters in the novel are the tailor's daughter, Eliza, who in
Goan circles would be deemed to be of low caste, and Jorge, the son of a
landowner, deemed to be of the upper caste. Nevertheless, accidental contact
has led them to become romantically involved and there is much in the novel
about intrigue and strategy within such a romantic association.
Eliza is quickly besotted with Jorge and sees him as a potential husband to
be taken by her and her family to Nairobi, Kenya, to a new life there. In
turn, Jorge appears to be fascinated by Eliza and there is a hint, even if
given fleetingly, that a marriage on his part to Eliza is a consideration.
Fairly soon, however, the greater force of caste triumphs and Eliza is
discarded, as are many of Jorge's previous romantic and sexual conquests of
young lower caste Catholic women.
In the novel, Eliza travels to Goa from Nairobi where her parents run a
flourishing tailoring business. That she should learn tailoring
professionally does not seem surprising; she enrolls at a tailoring school
in Margao, the commercial capital of Goa-a place known well to me. The
tailoring school is run by Senhora Lopes, a kindly older lady who takes
Eliza under her wing professionally but also as her mentor and landlady.
At this stage, Eliza is already romantically associated with Diogo in
Nairobi who has been enamoured by her and writes to her in Goa for her hand
in marriage on her return to Kenya within the year. Diogo's letter reaches
Eliza at almost the same time that Jorge pays much attention to Eliza in Goa
and takes her to a number of socials and introduces her to his many friends
and acquaintances. Soon, Eliza feels convinced that Jorge loves her and they
engage in pleasurable sex as often as possible. Indeed, she informs her
parents in Nairobi that Jorge is now very much part of her life and likely
to join her in Nairobi on her return to the city. To be sure, she has no
hesitation in proclaiming her love for Jorge and, understandably, expects
Jorge to reciprocate the sentiment. But she has to drag out his statement of
love for her with much effort!
In time, Eliza senses that Jorge is more interested in her sexually than
emotionally and notes a certain cooling off in his ardour towards her. In
turn, Jorge attributes minor and temporary setbacks in their relationship to
the illness of his widowed father for whom he owes a duty of care. At first,
Eliza accepts Jorge's story but after a while decides to meet Jorge's father
and explore to what extent Jorge has been truthful.
She makes her way, unannounced, to Jorge's father's home. Neither Jorge nor
his father is at home but she befriends and is befriended by the maid
servant at the house. It soon becomes clear that the maid servant is keen to
help Eliza with a view to eventually being taken by her to Nairobi to work
in Eliza's and Jorge's household following a marriage.
When Jorge's ardour for Eliza clearly cools significantly and he finds many
reasons not to meet her as often as he had done in the past, Eliza decides
to propose marriage to him and indicates that her parents would help him
financially to establish himself in Nairobi. However, it becomes clear that
such a proposition is not immediately attractive to Jorge. His view is that
his elderly father, in poor health, would need him in Goa for medical
support but also to manage their productive agricultural lands and other
properties that the family owned.
By now, Eliza realises that she has to use more drastic means of persuasion
to win her man in Goa but without writing off Diogo in Nairobi. She writes a
warm but non-committal reply to Diogo and proceeds to meet up with Jorge's
allegedly sick father who, while being civil to her, makes it clear that he
did not particularly welcome her overtures to Jorge nor her idea of taking
him to Nairobi following a marriage. Earlier, Eliza had been alerted by
Senhora Lopes and Silvia, a teacher and her roommate in Margao, to be
careful about Jorge as someone who befriended girls like Eliza and then got
rid of them, whilst also sexually satisfying a number of local women whose
husbands were away at work on the high seas. Initially, Eliza rejects their
advice, believing that the two women (Lopes and Silvia) are indeed jealous
of her because of her 'success' with Jorge.
By now, Jorge is less demonstrative regarding his love for Eliza but
nevertheless enjoys her body at every opportunity. This is when Eliza
decides on the simple chicanery of saying that she had become pregnant by
Jorge.
"I don't believe you're pregnant."
"Perhaps I'll ask your father how he would like to have a bastard for a
grandchild."
The silence was deafening. Eliza knew she had him exactly where she wanted
him. This time she was the bait on the hook and he the unsuspecting fish.
"I'll marry you," he said finally.
Although Jorge had been very careful in his sexual encounters with Eliza
except for once or twice when he did not use a condom at Eliza's insistence,
he is highly skeptical that Eliza is indeed pregnant. Thus, he formulates a
scheme whereby he invites Eliza to his father's house to meet several of his
friends. When Eliza arrives, on some pretext she is led to a quiet side room
where Jorge's friends have her quickly spread-eagled on a bed and in next to
no time, while her screams are silenced, a supposedly unqualified
'gynaecologist' draws out a range of surgical instruments to abort the said
pregnancy. However, when he examines Eliza internally, he concludes and
informs Jorge that Eliza is definitely not pregnant. This infuriates Jorge
to no end and he effectively discards Eliza like an old rag that has no
further use to him.
Eliza is now certain that her game is up with Jorge and, on completing her
training, makes her way back to Nairobi where she is forced to disclose to
her parents that there will be no Jorge in her life. She settles down to
establish her independent tailoring business. It is at this point that the
novel comes to an unforeseen dramatic end.
Diogo, now married to an upper-caste Goan woman like himself, visits Eliza
at her shop in Nairobi and it becomes clear to the reader that Diogo and
Eliza have an ongoing sexual relationship even though Diogo has a wife of
his own.
As the novel ends, we note that Eliza is now in the kind of sexual
relationship that Senhora Lopes had warned her about in Goa. Lopes had
explicitly recounted to Eliza that Jorge's father, Nazarinho Pacheco had
used her as his mistress, promised marriage to her on his widowhood but had
failed to keep his promise whilst still enjoying Lopes sexually. The sins of
the father with Lopes had thus clearly visited Eliza through his son Jorge.
Senhora Lopes' advice to Eliza was that upper caste men do not marry lower
caste women but are happy to use them sexually for as long as possible.
"The bhatkar believes in elitism, Eliza. Jorge enjoys the status his
position has given him. Don't think for one moment that he'll jeopardize
that status by marrying someone from a lower caste. It's simply not done. He'll
endeavour to enhance that status by marrying above his class for the sake of
money and privilege. Jorge's father took this route and his progeny isn't
going to reverse it. This is a caste-bound and class-conscious society,
Eliza. The bhatkars will take whatever they can get and make you feel they're
doing you a big favour by using and abusing you."
In sum, the novel is a vivid account of Catholic Goan hypocrisy in which the
upper castes will only marry their own kind but sow their wild oats with
women whom they consider to be their social inferiors. There are exceptions
to this situation, of course, but are generally much derided by the upper
castes, for whom strict endogamy within a supposed pedigree is very much a
creed.
This novel of 343 pages gripped my attention from start to finish. Clearly,
Ben Antao is a wonderful and insightful storyteller who has infused much
thought and imagination into this well-crafted novel that projects Goa in
all its charming detail.
Here's an example of his writing style. "One day after the rain had ceased
its merry dance, the sun broke through the clouds, as though it was
reasserting its preeminence in the universe. The scene outside became
iridescently beautiful, with the appearance of a multi-colored rainbow that
seemed to be positioned directly over the boarding house. Eliza stood in the
veranda, inhaling the fresh, tingling air that smelled of soggy earth. The
petite coconut palms bordering the rectangle looked much greener than
before, as though the monsoon had spilled chlorophyll over the flora to
dazzle the viewer. The palms swung gently in the morning breeze, shedding
drops of rainwater from their feathery ribs, and today, after a fortnight
beneath an overcast sky, they basked under the golden sun."
I've also read and enjoyed his first two novels, Blood & Nemesis and
Penance. It is, therefore, my hope that he will continue to produce other
equally excellent novels that will increasingly reach a wide audience.
As an educational sociologist but well versed in reading and teaching about
novels too, I was most pleased to see that the two modes of addressing
social issues are not too dissimilar. Indeed, was it not Charles Dickens,
the esteemed novelist, who wrote so illuminatingly about the conditions of
the poor in London and who was later deemed to be an equally good
sociologist of the time? In this respect, I applaud Ben Antao's skill and
craftsmanship with the pen and key pad in writing so well and pleasing ever
so many readers like myself.
Published by the Goan Observer in 2007, the novel is available in major
bookstores (Rs.200) in Goa, and in North America ($25) from the author at
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
London, England
October 1, 2008
(Dr. DaCosta is an adjunct professor of education, Florida State University
at the London, UK Centre. He is also a consultant on university education in
the UK.)
http://www.goanet.org/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=780#Cornel
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