Kamala Markandaya was a pseudonym used by Kamala Purnaiya Taylor who was born on 01 January 1924 and died on 16 May 2004. She was an Indian novelist and journalist. A native of Mysore, India, Markandaya was a graduate of Madras University, and afterwards published several short stories in Indian newspapers. After India declared its independence, Markandaya moved to Britain, however, she still considered herself an Indian expatriate long afterwards.
Known for writing about culture between Indian urban and rural societies, Markandaya's first published novel, Nectar in a Sieve, was a bestseller and cited as an American Library Association Notable Book in 1955.
The book is set in India during a period of intense urban development and is the chronicle of the marriage between Rukmani, youngest daughter of a village headman, and Nathan, a tenant farmer. The story is told in the first person by Rukmani, beginning from her arranged marriage to Nathan at the age of 12 to his death many years later.
Food is a critical aspect in the development of the story, Rukmani and Nathan struggle to feed their children and to pay the rent on the land that gives them life. Although difficulties continue to worsen, they quietly resign themselves to ever-increasing sufferings: flood, famine, even death, yet they stick to their hopes for a better future.
For everyone food is important, but for them Food is everything, it is their whole life, without the farm to produce food, their lives are ruined.
