SINGULARITY AND UNCERTAINTY:

Mrs. A.’s reflections on her daydream of “Hindu Socialism” continually returned to the conditions of marriage and her life as a privileged but unhappy Hindu wife. The eldest daughter in a progressive Gandhian family, though her marriage was a love match, she had been hurried into it and made to put aside her education when her family suffered a turn in financial fortune. As she reflected on thwarted ambitions, past loves, and current friendships, new concerns arose: perhaps her husband was having an affair, perhaps his parents were seeking another wife. Weaving these concerns with memories of childhood, she mapped connections between sexuality and the ethical foundations of marriage, those emphasizing emplacement, certainty, and belonging and casting dilemmas of female agency as matters of relationships. Describing the gendered double standards of those ideals, she imagined herself alongside Draupadi, heroine of the Mahabharata, and reflected on her erotically charged friendship with woman named Vidya. As a vision of life beyond marriage came into view, so did counter-ethical ideals for founding her future. Ideas about singularity and the pleasures of uncertainty helped her imagine not only her own future, but that of a just, independent society with an equal place for women.