Lately, my FYP has been flooded with reels telling me how I can become "disgustingly well-read". I don't know how I feel about that adverb being associated with being well-read, and as much as I believe these reels are another way for social media to make you feel like you're not doing enough, without necessarily sparking the curiosity that would motivate you to do more, I do also think we can all be a little more well-read.

In times of crisis, like the one our country is going through as it comes to yet another reckoning about women's safety, and their basic right to simply exist without being harassed, haggled or, well, murdered, it is hard not to feel helpless. I have found that one of the few things that helps when I feel I can't do anything, because I can't possibly change public perception about how women should be treated, a perception built over centuries, is to know and read more: to educate myself about the whys, hows and what-ifs of an issue.

So we have put together a syllabus, if you'd like to call it that: a list of books, both fiction and non-fiction, and movies that can help us understand how we have reached this position in our country. The list has pieces of media that provide moments of levity and poignancy as we try to see what actionable changes we can make, not just to legislation but also in our day-to-day lives, to make our society equal and safer for women. Because as John Laurens says in 'Hamilton': "We'll never be truly free if those in bondage don't have the same rights as you and me."

Non-Fiction

'Seeing Like A Feminist' is an almost sociological overview that unpacks  how feminism changes the way we read everyday life, from family and marriage to law and desire, and challenges assumptions we rarely think to question. The book is incisive and pointed in the world it paints. Read it online at The Internet Archive or get your copy here.

'Why Loiter?' is a study of how women navigate public space in a city often called India's safest, and it asks a quietly radical question: why should women only be allowed on the street when they have somewhere to be? And as someone who is an avid loiterer, the book does an excellent job arguing that the right to take risks and simply take up space is as essential as the demand for safety. Read it here or get your copy here.

Fiction

Ismat Chughtai wrote about women's desires, domestic lives and quiet rebellions with a frankness that got her dragged to court for obscenity over her story 'Lihaaf', her sharp, witty and fearless stories show how long women have been pushing against the boundaries drawn around them. Start with Lihaaf or her short story collections. Read it here.

I recently read 'The Palace of Illusions' for the first time, and the book was an exemplary example of how our depictions and representations of women have been, at best, flat from the time of our ancient texts. Her books take mythological women from Sita (The Forest of Enchantments) to Draupadi (Palace of Illusions) and tell these ancient sagas and myths through their lens, showing us the lives they could have and should have always lived in our books. Get your copies here.

Burnt Sugar follows Antara as she cares for her mother, Tara, whose free-spirited, neglectful ways shaped Antara's childhood and who is now losing her memory. Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, it is an unflinching, darkly funny look at motherhood, and the burdens women carry within families, and it shows how expectations of womanhood are passed down from one generation to the next. Get your copy here.

'Maria Just Maria', takes the trope of a ‘mad woman’ and subverts it. It begins with a recently divorced woman in a psychiatric hospital and travels back through her unconventional Kerala childhood. The book is hilarious but also shows how women get labelled ‘abnormal’ if they don’t follow the course of life set for them, and the way we pigeon hole them until their back is against the wall. Get your copy here.

Films

Aattam follows a theatre troupe of men and one woman, whose celebration of a successful show is followed by an incident of sexual harassment. What follows is a tense, talky drama in which the group "debates" what happened, and the film becomes a sharp study of complicity. Watch Aattam on Amazon Prime Video.

Parched tells the story of four women in a village in Rajasthan, among them a widow, a young bride and a dancer, who live under the weight of child marriage, domestic violence, and the control of men and elders. It is a raw but warm portrait of friendship, desire, and defiance, and of how small acts of freedom add up.

Set in a conservative colony, this dark comedy follows a mother and her two daughters, long shunned and gossiped about by their neighbours, who find themselves in trouble when a neighbour apparently dies in their home. Funny, chaotic and pointed, it takes a common gendered insult and turns it into a celebration of the "bad women" society loves to police. Watch Maa Behen on Netflix.

In this dark comedy, Radhika Apte plays Uma, a young woman trapped in an arranged marriage in a Mumbai chawl who slowly breaks free of the life expected of her, with a supernatural twist. It is an odd, deadpan, and genuinely original take on a woman refusing to be tamed. Watch Sister Midnight on Hotstar.

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