Gendered Experiences of Grief: Exploring the Complexities of Melancholic Subjectivities in The Blind Man’s Garden by Nadeem Aslam

Abstract

This paper discusses how a gendered sense of identities complicates experiences of grief. It analyzes the characters of Rohan and Naheed, in Nadeem Aslam’s The Blind Man’s Garden, to see how they cope with loss through a gendered lens, particularly through the exploration of grief and loss. Naheed, due to her flexible sense of subjectivity, finds a way to come out of her submissiveness as her loss shapes her life course. Her mother, Tara, on the other hand, has internalized patriarchy, which makes it difficult for her to move forward in life. It is because of Naheed’s determination to question and her flexible nature that she rejects patriarchal norms, which ultimately helps her to move forward from her loss. Rohan, being a rigid patriarch, is forced by his grief to reflect on his male privileges towards the end of the novel. He becomes slightly reflective of his past in a different way, after going through multiple losses. Drawing on insights from mourning and melancholia by Sigmund Freud, Judith Butler, and Maru Ritu, this paper engages with the discussion of gendered subjectivities to explore how these identities intersect and shape the process of grief.