Sara Joseph

Sarah Joseph (born 1946) is a novelist and short story writer in Malayalam. She won the Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award for her novel Aalahayude Penmakkal (Daughters of God the Father). She also received the Vayalar Award for the same novel. Sarah has been at the forefront of the feminist movement in Kerala and is the founder of Manushi (organisation of thinking women). She and Madhavikutty are considered among the leading women writers in Malayalam. She has recently joined the Aam Aadmi Party and is contesting the 2014 Lok Sabha elections from Thrissur.

Early and personal life

Sarah Joseph was born into a conservative Christian family at Kuriachira in Thrissur city in 1946 to Louis and Kochumariam. She attended the teacher's training course and began her professional career as a school teacher. Later, she received her M.A. inMalayalam and joined the collegiate service in Kerala. She served as a Professor of Malayalam at Sanskrit College, Pattambi. She has since retired from government service and lives at Mulamkunnathukavu in Thrissur district.

Sarah Joseph is also a well-known social activist and was at the forefront of several agitations in Kerala. She was an ardent left-sympathiser but joined the Aam Aadmi Party in January 2014 and has been fielded by the party as a candidate from the Thrissur Lok Sabha constituency in the 2014 parliament elections.

Literary career

Sarah Joseph's literary career began very early, when she was in high school. Many of her poems appeared in Malayalam weeklies. She was also good at reciting her poems at poets' meets which was much appreciated by poets like Vyloppilli Sreedhara Menon andEdasseri Govindan Nair. After a short period of uncertainty she took to fiction and began writing short stories. Her collection of short stories Paapathara is considered a milestone in feminist writing in Malayalam.

She has published a trilogy of novels which includes Aalahayude Penmakkal, Mattathi, and Othappu. Her works are essentially liberalistic and convey the sentiments of various oppressed groups. The novel Othappu is about a woman's yearning for a true understanding of spirituality and her own sexuality. Othappu has been translated into English by Valson Thampu under the title "Othappu: The Scent of the Other Side". Her novel Aalahayude Penmakkal won her three major awards – the Kerala Sahitya Academy Award, the Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award, and the Vayalar Award. In 2011, Sarah won the Muttathu Varkey Award for her collection of short stories titled Papathara.

She has won much critical acclaim for her Ramayana Kathakal, a subversive reading of the Ramayana. An English translation of this work has been published by the Oxford University Press.

Selected works

Short stories

• Manassile Thee Matram (1973)
• Kadinte Sangeetham (1975, anthology of short stories)
• Paapathara
• Oduvilathe Suryakanthi
• Nilavu Nirayunnu
• Puthuramayanam
• Kaadithu Kandaayo Kaanthaa
• Nanmathinmakalude Vriksham (anthology of short stories)

Novels

• Thaikulam
• Aalahayude Penmakkal
• Maattaathi
• Othappu
• Aathi
• Ooru Kaval
• Aalohari Anandam