I am letting you into no secret when I say that that this world suffers from several forms of deprivation. But the deprivation of the mind that causes suffering to women is among the worst.

I have been troubled by two incidents that I read over the last few weeks. One of them is about the Nobel Laureate, V S Naipaul; the other about the alleged rapist father, Fritzl.

I will talk about Naipaul first. He is a writer who has my greatest admiration. His novel ‘A House for Mr Biswas’ remains one of the best books I have read. 

I have one thing about writers – they are not men and women without flaws; many of them are not examples of moral uprightness. For every morally steadfast Dr Johnson, there is a myriad Boswells, consorting with prostitutes, or a thousand Archers allegedly defrauding people. However, their ability and genius is in their trade, which is why they merit my attention and time. Therefore, I find it skewed reasoning when somebody tells me that he stopped reading Archer because the author went to prison for fraud. Some time back when I read about Sir Vidia’s candid admission that his mental cruelty for almost forty years towards his first wife Patricia Ann Hale might have contributed to her demise, I felt uncomfortable with his actions, but that did not diminish my admiration of his genius, or turn me away from his works. 

Recently, I read about Sir Vidia’s treatment of his Lady Patricia in greater detail, and I found myself less accommodating of this great writer. His cruelty and insensitivity are beyond the realms of moral turpitude that I refrian from judging writers by. Patricia Ann Hale, with a fine face and a loving heart, gave up everything, her family, her friends, to support and (eventually) marry a penniless West Indian in an era of extreme racial prejudice. She supported him financially when he was without work, and throughout her sad life remained his sounding board, and more, for his writing. In return, he humiliated her, he stopped her acting career, he even refused to give her a wedding ring. Three years into their marriage, he started visiting prostitutes for paid sex, while his wife worked to support him. Then he met an Argentinean, and openly carried on with an adulterous affair, even telling the long suffering Patricia that he missed his mistress.  

When cancer struck Patricia, and she had a mastectomy performed, his cruelty did not diminish. He still used her to help him with his writing, in a critical and clerical sort of way. Even knowing about his infidelity, she supported him, in an exhibition of female love that I can never comprehend. She had started recovering from cancer, when the writer publicly announced that he regularly visited prostitutes. This public humiliation affected her, and the cancer returned. Sir Vidia, at that time, was onto a new love in his life, a Pakistani. He apparently felt angry that Patricia was not dying quickly enough for him to get on with his life. He brought the Pakistani lady into his house the day after Pat’s funeral. He remarried within the next two months. 

The case of the alleged rapist Josef Fritzl has been splashed across the news media, in great and agonising detail. For those that do not know, Josef allegedly imprisoned his daughter Elisabeth in a windowless dungeon for twenty four years, and fathered seven children by her. One child died immediately after birth, three children were transported out of the dungeon to Josef’s home upstairs, and the other three lived with their mother in the dungeon. By a quirk of fate, the case came to light, and the mother and her children were released. Incest has been proven through DNA tests. Josef is in prison, awaiting trial, and the mother and her children are in psychiatric care.

Elisabeth’s mother apparently had not realised what was going on. Josef concocted a story of how his daughter Elisabeth had run away with a mysterious sect and was living with them. He got his captive daughter to write notes that said that that she was leaving her children at their door step for him to take care of. Josef even went on holidays to the east for weeks together, while his daughter and her children remained locked up in their windowless dungeon. It is a story of extreme cruelty and unimaginable deprivation.

What hurts me most, and makes me very angry, is the attitude of men like Naipaul and Fritzl to the women that are part of their family, women, who would care for these men, and who would love them with their whole heart. The woman, as compared to the man, is capable of positive emotions in a relationship at a scale that the male cannot even comprehend. As somebody (I think it was Harold Robbins) said: ‘Love is an incident in a man’s life, it is the whole history of a woman’s life.’  Fame, or power, or both go into the minds of men, and they think that because they are famous, or hold power over their near and dear ones, it is their inalienable right to torture the very women that love them, that supported them, that would give up their own happiness so that these men can be happier. How wrong they are!! Theirs is no inalienable right; theirs is a crime that they will have to answer for: either in this life, or beyond. There is still justice in this world and an unforgiving God in the next.

Why should women cry? Whether it is in Austria or in Afghanistan, London or Lebanon, can’t we stop women from crying? (This is not to say that there are no cruel women. I have seen horrifying examples of women’s cruelty to other women too; and that is equally repulsive).

When I was a teenager, I used to listen to a Boney M song: ‘No woman no cry!’ (I did not find the lyrics impressive, but for that one starting line.) Those of you that read this blog, my request to you is: let us do what we can, however small, however little, towards realising a world where the Boney M song becomes a reality.

 ‘No Woman No Cry!’

References:

The innumerable articles and news stories on both Naipaul and the Fritzls.