The book is titled “Homeless.” The reason for that is not that its character doesn’t have a home; it means that she doesn’t have herself. Due to her fears, anxieties, and insecurities, every minute she suffered severe loneliness.

Over the past decade, literature on LGBT issues has begun to flourish. Earlier, in movies and literature, we have noticed LGBT people being humiliated and hurt as jokers, objects of comedy, making fun of them. This is still happening. But now, LGBT people are talking about their problems, sufferings and hardships, and fighting for rights and changes in laws. A few literary personalities stood up to support their struggle but it was very limited. To overcome that, like Dalits writing Dalitist literature, women writing feminist literature, LGBT people are also creating strong literature to voice their arguments.

Still, there is no proper understanding of gay, lesbian, bisexual in rural India. Most people who know about LGBT have serious opposition. Although there is some awareness about transgender, there is no consensus among the general public, and there are several reasons for this. There is a lot of difference between Gender and Sexuality. If Gender represents the body, Sexuality represents the sexual interest.

A ‘gay’ person is a man who likes men. Being attracted to men should not make ‘gays’ feel like women! Likewise, lesbians are attracted to women. So it would be foolish to argue that they are different and not women. Lesbians are women who are not attracted to men. Many are against the homosexuality. Their argument is that LGBT people are polluting society and values. What we need to remember is that this is not new and strange. Also, it is not imported from western countries. There is a mention of such people in history and mythology.

K. Vaishali, author of the book

K. Vaishali is a self-proclaimed lesbian. She also has Dyslexic disorder since childhood. It results in many problems in reading, writing, and remembering people. Surpassing them, “Homeless,” a novel of 234 pages, was presented to the English literary world.

After telling her mother that she was a lesbian, she faced severe opposition from her mother. Loneliness, having to stay away from home, the failure of love, stress, anxiety, fluctuations in studies, family problems, other physical and mental issues, and defects have been collated and brought to us in a novel. She wrote the novel based on her experiences in university and the problems she faced since childhood.

Vaishali is sharing her story here. She suffered because her father was a drunkard, and there was no harmony in the family

K. Vaishali belonged to a Brahmin family and did not support Brahmin ideology. She opposed caste and color systems. She openly declared that she got out of that quicksand. Father was a drunkard, the younger brother also has Dyslexic problem. Mother was a person of traditional Brahmin ideology. Because of father’s drunkenness and his mistakes, he lost many jobs, and having to move to cities for new jobs, the Vaishali family had to stay in cities like Mumbai, Chennai, and Coimbatore in India.

As a result, Vaishali could not make many friends. Befriended a few people for a short time, but that friendship could not last. It is because the importance people give to things is not given to friendship and emotions. Moreover, Vaishali had insecurity, fear, and anxiety since the age of ten. Diagnosed Dyslexic after twenty years but the symptoms were evident even before that.

The first thing that seriously affected Vaishali’s life was issues at home. Fights between parents, father beating her mother while drunk, mother acting like nothing happened the next day made Vaishali think more. Due to the turmoil in the family, the idea of staying away from parents and family was ingrained in her from an early age. As a part of that, she joined the university hostel to do PG in Hyderabad University.

The book is titled “Homeless.” The reason for that is not that she doesn’t have a home; it means that she doesn’t have herself. Due to her fears, anxieties, and insecurities, every minute she suffered severe loneliness. Before joining Hyderabad University, she worked as an office boy and other jobs. She could not stay anywhere due to her dyslexic problems. After that, she went to Hyderabad University for PG. She should have written office girl instead of office boy. Vaishali should realize that our society has evolved from office boy to office girl.

Lesbian, Dyslexic are the main objects in this novel. But rather than these things, the novel revolves around many other things.

The novel flows in two ways. Writing about her experiences at the university, she reminisced about her past and told the readers many incidents. This novel lacks strong characters and character background, and characters have no voice. The object of the novel is not one but many. Due to the presence of many objects, the novel lacks the reader’s connectivity due to the lack of strong characters. It is a proven fact that readers take seriously what is said by strong characters instead of single character narration.

It is not wrong to have many objects in the novel, but the main object dominates, and the novel loses its character by unnecessary stretching of sub-stories, events, and some elements. For any work, the object, the sculpture, is the main thing. The object should not swallow the sculpture, and the sculpture should not swallow the object.

If the novel is not progressed with a strong, different object and a proper sculpture and narrative, the object of the novel and its contents will not be close to the hearts of the readers. Also, taking a common object and trying to insert elements unrelated to the object into the narrative is not a characteristic of a great novel.

Lesbian, Dyslexic are the main objects in this novel. But rather than these things, the novel revolves around many other things. Although she had the opportunity to represent the lesbian community, she was unable to do so. She could not talk about her experiences, feelings, and rights as a lesbian by highlighting the problems she faced in the society.

Dyslexic is widely discussed. It is wonderful that there are many elements in the novel about the problems and difficulties faced by dyslexic people. During her stay in the Hyderabad University hostel, the problems caused by insects in the toilets, no proper water in toilets, electricity issues, no hygienic and healthy food, feeling insecure while staying in the room with the door not properly closed, feeling lonely, embarrassed not being able to tell others what she is, are the sub-plots in the novel.

She likes to write and read, but due to dyslexia, problems like not being able to read and write caused her serious trouble. Because of that problem, the text is not visible properly, but she has stepped towards literature. Being subjected to domestic violence from mother, leaving home due to lack of reassurance and love from family, internal anxiety about what society thinks about her, OCD, PCOD, sinus, Insomnia, Sleep Paralysis, Dysgraphia, menstrual problems, etc. is this novel about.

In this novel, the problems faced by her as a university student and staying in the hostel are told more than the problems she faced as a lesbian. The pain of not being able to leave the room and bleeding from the body during menstruation is indescribable. It means that every hostel student is suffering. She has to go to the toilet repeatedly during menstruation. Due to unhygienic toilets, lack of water, leaving the hostel and going to the toilet in a mall is a plight. This is enough to show how developed our country is.

When she went out to buy clothes with her mother, Vaishali told her mother about it when several men molested her. Vaishali doesn’t like her mother telling her that men are like that only and we should just move on regardless. Moreover, telling the incident that happened to her and discussing such things is taboo. After that, Vaishali does not go there to buy clothes. It is a shameful thing for parents to say such things, like not to discuss and fight back. Vaishali’s mother’s statement generalizing ‘men are like that’ is not correct. Maybe the character intention is about a few men, so the author has to pass clear statements with characters.

If a novel is a collection of many events and lives, then the composition of those events also needs to be arranged beautifully like a flower garland. Only then will the garland be beautiful. Apart from that, it can be observed in the novel that she switched several times going forward and backward, stretched some scenes and left some other important situations halfway. She has written in great depth about hostel life, not taking the opportunity to discuss many other important matters like Lesbian issues, rights, sufferings, etc.

The plot of the novel begins with telling her mother that she is unemployed and a lesbian. She then describes the many problems she faced and is said to have approached a girl named Mridula at the end abruptly. A character is created out of necessity, and the ending is artificially given, and it doesn’t feel like a natural ending.

If Mridula is a girl in her hostel then she might have been mentioned somewhere in the novel. Otherwise, the introduction of the character at the end of the novel feels like a cinematic story. The novel, which begins with a natural move, ends unsatisfyingly with an unnatural ending.

A novel must have a story and narrative along with characters, scenes, events, and contexts that help to make it strong. The lack of background for the characters and the fact that no character has a strong voice are the things that hurt. It appears that the author has used the characters for her needs and has not allowed the characters to develop as independent characters.

Rather than Unnecessary descriptions, the author emphasized the feelings and principles she believed in. The pain used in the novel, the structure of the sentences, and the sentiments expressed are lofty and lead the society towards progress.

Whether they are male or female, the author needs to assert with characters who have bad habits that these habits are detrimental and should be eliminated. Moreover, Vaishali is sharing her story here. She suffered because her father was a drunkard, and there was no harmony in the family. At that time, she should have recognized the need to explicitly declare within the narrative that it was wrong, or at least, she should have made a clear statement about it.

The main character in the novel has a habit of smoking cigarettes and is a drunkard. Although it is a personal matter of the character, the writer needs to deny and declare that it is wrong. Acknowledging our faults and letting go of it should be the hallmark of good character. It can be more aptly called an autobiography than a novel. Homeless is a compilation of many incidents in Vaishali’s life.

A person’s story is a society’s story when the author is conscious in making the personal aspects into societal. Rather than my pain being the society’s pain, the society’s pain is my pain is perfect.

Published under International Cooperation with "Sindh Courier"