Victim-Perpetrator Relationship: Reconnoitering Typology of Victimization in Anita Nair’s Eating Wasps

Abstract

Violence against women is not new from feticide to cyberbullying. It remains unchanged and experienced by all ages of women from perpetrators in the patriarchal hegemony. Every form of violence affects millions of women’s lives irrespective of age, class, culture, language, religion, and education, and it cannot be stopped by anything due to deep-rooted patriarchy and gender stereotypes. Men (gender stereotypes) become the primary reason for the violence against women and women become vulnerable victims as they are considered ‘Other’, the weaker sex. Victimization has a physical and psychological impact on victims’ rest of their lives. Anita Nair, an Indian author vociferates the different forms of victimization in the modern era in her latest literary oeuvre Eating Wasps (2018). Megha, a six-year-old child, Liliana, an Italian spinster and Najma, a Muslim girl do not share any contribution to victimization but being in the hapless situation entitles them to be victimized. Yet, they are denied to accept the tag ‘victim’ and become survivors by fighting against the odds in their society. This study traverses the relationship between victims and perpetrators through the lens of Benjamin Mendelsohn’s typology of victimization and the challenges encountered by victims in the patriarchal environment.