Suttee and the reaction by it from the British society and Olivia

First of all, the word suttee or sati means faithful wife in India.

Suttee is a funeral practise in which the widowed women follow their dead husbands by burning themselves together with their husbands.

Not all women do it voluntarily and often are constrained to do it. Therefore, it was much disputed. It is stated that a widow could expect little of life after her husband’s death, especially if she had no children.  Her death can be seen as an ending of the marriage.

Most of accounts describe the woman sitting or lying down on the funeral pyre beside her dead husband. Many other accounts describe women walking or jumping into the flames after the fire had been lit, and some even lighted up themselves.

The total figure of known procedures during the years 1813 to 1828 is 8135, another source gives a comparable number of 7941 from 1815 to 1828.

British society: The British mostly are disgusted by this „act“. They don’t regard it as religion, but a form of suicide, although they first spoke even about the sanctity of religious practices. „It’s savagery, like everything else in this country is savagery and barbarism.“ (P.60, ll. 3-4) Here again can be recongnized the attitude of the British society towards the Indian. They regard them as barbaric people who are not on the same level with them and don’t accept other religions than their own, which seems to be the best and the only right one.

Olivia: Olivia sees it as a part of the religion in India to be burned together with the husband. If a woman remains without her husband it should be her own decision to leave with him or not, and no one should try to bias her or prevent the burning. “ And quite apart from religion, it is their culture and who are we to interfere with anyone’s culture especially an ancient one like theirs.“(P. 59, ll. 11-13) Besides she thinks it to be a noble act, to follow ones husband.“ I mean, to want to go with the person you care for most in the world. Not to want to be alive any more if he wasn’t.“(P.60 ll. 1-2). In the moment she says this, she doesn’t dare to look into Douglas eyes because she feels too embarrassed, but shortly after they look at each other with enormous affection. So mainly she sees it as a decision of love if to go with him, or not. She even would die for Douglas.

Satipur or the mountains- which location is better?

Is there really a change in the life of Olivia? Is she happier now that she has eloped with the Nawab, who bought her a house in the town of X in the mountains? Or did the situation remain the old one?
Well, I think that actually she has reached no real change.

Olivia didn’t like Satipur very much. She had not a real friend between the English women. Certainly, she knew all of them and spent much time with Beth Crawford, but actually she was alone all the time. While she visited the Begum with Beth Crawford she was the one to be silent all the time, not knowing the language. And because of their late arrival all the English women already had chosen a kind of best friend for them, so that she was not so much integrated as the others. She spent many hours alone in the house, playing the piano and reading, or simply expecting the heat to go. Douglas, her husband, was at work all day long, and often in the evening returned so late that they had not much time for conversation.

A new „time“ started during the initial period, when she began to visit the Nawab. She often stayed with Harry and found someone to talk with in him. And the Nawab was the first one to really donate her attention. They made trips together, visited the shrine and he showed her the whole Palace, which for most of the inhabitants remained unseen for their whole life.
As they fall in love a big problem becomes the centre of her life and attention: the choice between the Nawab, who was already married and her husband Douglas. Then she even got pregnant and both of them thought to be the father of the child.

After having aborted it she’s not capable to look into Douglas eyes, so she immediately goes to the Palace and leaves Kathm without having seen Douglas anymore.

And then the same situation from the beginning returns. She lives alone in the house the Nawab has bought for her and he only sometimes comes to visit her. The letters to Marcia begin to get shorter and finally disappear completely. She is alone, plays piano and passes her time maybe by reading. So finally, she returned to be in the same way of living as she was before in Satipur with Douglas. She didn’t gain anything.

P. 39-43 Olivia’s and Douglas’ relationship

Thinking longer about their relationship I realized that it isn’t really as good as it seems at first. Douglas, who works like a Trojan doesn’t involve Olivia in any way in his work, so that she does almost never know what he’s doing currently. Nonetheless, she admires his way of speaking about it towards the men he’s working with. As he backbites over them she tries to protest against it, but he doesn’t even realize what she meant and switches off the pipe, instead. Even as she asks him about his work and his growing knowledge of Hindu, which she wants to gain too, he’s not interested and says that these are a men’s problems. Her wishes doesn’t seem to interest him, and in fact he doesn’t even notice her outer appearance, not recognizing the dress she wore so often.
Concerning the trip to Simla he already arranged everything with Beth Crawford, without asking her before if she wants to go or not. In fact, she doesn’t want to. As he says, „It’s the way it has to be.“. The only thing remaining is to implore him to let her stay with him.