There are two “flights” in this story by Kamala Das. The first occurs after a successful sculptor finds city living and her city models devoid of inspiration. Once dependent on her husband, who is now disabled and dependent on her, she has a new sense of control over her life. They move to a dream house by the sea where, re-inspired, she becomes infatuated with a seventeen-year-old nude model. She once again “takes flight” upon finding her husband having sex with the girl, this time into the sea. Themes include marriage, lust, gender roles, control, art, betrayal.
It is fascinating to contemplate the reason for the husband rediscovering his libido. She writes that before becoming disabled he was oversexed and regarded her purely as a sexual plaything: It was only through a sacrificial offering of my body that I could satisfy him. If I had been paralysed in his place he would not have put up with me for more than a year. He would not have fed and clothed a wife who did not perform her duties in bed. In the Indian patriarchal culture of the day, he would have felt emasculated to be dependent on and under his wife’s control. In addition to the temptation of seeing the girl’s naked body in his wife’s studio, the class difference (he the spouse of her employer and she a young “rustic” girl) may have re-empowered his sexual drive. His new-found lust backfires, as his wife’s departure will leave him helpless and destitute.
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