Living Life Through Writing: A Feminist Autoethnographical Reading of Ismat Chughtai’s A Life in Words, Saeeda Bano’s Off the Beaten Track and Zarina Bhatty’s Purdah to Piccadilly
N. Safrine1 , S. Rasheeda Sulthana2
1Independent Researcher, Chennai, India; 2Assistant Professor and Research Supervisor, Research Department of English, Bharathi Women’s College, Chennai, India.
10.46679/9789349926509ch11
This chapter is a part of: Mapping the Trajectory of Indian Muslim Women’s Life-Writings: An Autoethnographical Approach from India
ISBN (Ebook): 978-93-49926-50-9
ISBN (Hardcover Print): 978-93-49926-84-4
ISBN (Softcover Print): 978-93-49926-34-9
© CSMFL Publications & its authors.
Published: April 15, 2026
Abstract
Celebrating life through writing is one of the prominent features of life-writing, a popular genre that has gained significant traction in the current times. It serves as a sought-after genre to not only record one’s lived experiences but also relive the experiences by recalling the memories that shaped the author’s personality. This paper aims to explore the lives of three famous Indian Muslim women—Ismat Chughtai, Saeeda Bano and Zarina Bhatty through their powerful autobiographies. These three women belong to different professions—Chughtai is a prolific and accomplished writer who influenced the literary landscape of Indian women’s writings, Bhatty is the former president of the Indian Association for Women’s Studies (IAWS), New Delhi and Saeeda Bano is the first Indian woman to work as a radio newsreader. Apart from being known for their unique achievements, these three women carried a common identity of being an Indian Muslim woman. Their personal narratives poignantly document the many struggles they undergo because of this common identity yet it also deeply reflects their spirit of resilience and cultural connection which the paper attempts to study through the lens of feminist autoethnography. What shines through their writings is a passion to live against all the odds by embracing both the changes and challenges—a much needed lesson in the times that we live.
Keywords: Life-Writing, Indian Muslim Women, Feminist Autoethnography, Literary Landscape, Resilience
References
- Adams, T. E., Jones, S. L. H., & Ellis, C. (2015). Autoethnography.
- Bano, S. (2020). Off the Beaten Track: The Story of My Unconventional Life. Zubaan Books.
- Bhatty, Z. (2019). Purdah to Piccadilly: A Muslim Woman’s Struggle for Identity. SAGE Publications Pvt. Limited.
- Chugtai, I. (2013). Life in words: Memoirs. India Penguin Classics.
- Gannon, S. (2017). Troubling Autoethnography: Critical, Creative, and Deconstructive Approaches to Writing. In Critical, Creative, and Deconstructive Approaches to Writing (pp. 21–35). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47527-1_2
- Hosain, A. (1961). Sunlight on a broken column: A Novel.
- Smith, S., & Watson, J. (2001). Reading autobiography: A Guide for Interpreting Life Narratives. U of Minnesota Press.
This book is available worldwide via EBSCOhost Academic Collection, EBSCO E- books, Google Play Books, Amazon, World Cat Discovery Service/OCLC, CSMFL Bookstore, and 200+ book resellers and academic content vendors.
Statement on Publication Ethics
We, at CSMFL Publications, are committed to ensure the unbiased and transparent publishing, and upholding the high standards of editorial integrity in our publications. To know more, please read our Statement on Publication Ethics, Editorial Integrity & Misconduct