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waggaboy's review against another edition
3.0
I liked parts of this book but the mixture of narrative and internal thoughts caused me to lose interest.
byronic_reader's review against another edition
5.0
This is one of the book I feel close to my heart... The author doesn't play the victim card but she beautifully portrays the inner struggle felt by writer wife. Glad that I read this book.
bookbert's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
5.0
blodeuedd's review
3.0
I really do not know how to review this one. It is both raw, poetic and close.
We never even learn her name. It is told in first person and it is very matter of fact. A young writer falls for her professor. They both share a passion for communism. They marry and it all turns to hell. They are not married for long before she gets away, but that times shapes her. We see how he controls her more and more. Tells her what to do, what to think, what to wear. How he starts hitting her, raping her. How he even gets jealous of her thoughts.
But her thoughts are her freedom, in those she dreams herself away. In those she wonders how to escape. And she tells it like it is. People will always question why she did not do it before. It is never that easy. And it's not like society in India makes it easier either.
That is how it's raw and close. The poetic comes from her words. They are just flow in a simple way. This is her story. This is anyone's story. This is what the author went through
We never even learn her name. It is told in first person and it is very matter of fact. A young writer falls for her professor. They both share a passion for communism. They marry and it all turns to hell. They are not married for long before she gets away, but that times shapes her. We see how he controls her more and more. Tells her what to do, what to think, what to wear. How he starts hitting her, raping her. How he even gets jealous of her thoughts.
But her thoughts are her freedom, in those she dreams herself away. In those she wonders how to escape. And she tells it like it is. People will always question why she did not do it before. It is never that easy. And it's not like society in India makes it easier either.
That is how it's raw and close. The poetic comes from her words. They are just flow in a simple way. This is her story. This is anyone's story. This is what the author went through
spilledinksanket's review against another edition
5.0
When I hit you is a brutal, devastating tale about a young wife. It is a claustrophobic and terrifying read about domestic violence, marital rape and how all of us are in one way or another complicit with the act. I picked the book up after it got shortlisted for the @womensprize but kept postponing the read because of the difficult content . Fending of the mental devastation of cancer was all I had the courage for at that point.
But when I did pick it up it changed me. The book takes hold of your gut and wrenches it every now and then. You are never too far from it. The writing when it needs to reflect the obvious talents of Meena. There is flowing nature almost like poetry to her writing. In other places it conveys very effectively the narrator's absolute helplessness even as she stages her fightbacks , her small victories.
At one point in the novel Meena K. says the job of a writer is to "control the narrative". And she does that with all the dexterity of a surgeon. Picking at things that needs to be picked at, cutting off malignancies and letting the blood flow when it comes to that.
But when I did pick it up it changed me. The book takes hold of your gut and wrenches it every now and then. You are never too far from it. The writing when it needs to reflect the obvious talents of Meena. There is flowing nature almost like poetry to her writing. In other places it conveys very effectively the narrator's absolute helplessness even as she stages her fightbacks , her small victories.
At one point in the novel Meena K. says the job of a writer is to "control the narrative". And she does that with all the dexterity of a surgeon. Picking at things that needs to be picked at, cutting off malignancies and letting the blood flow when it comes to that.
cassiewbee's review against another edition
DNF’d 50%
Wasn’t bad, just wasn’t for me 🤷♀️
Wasn’t bad, just wasn’t for me 🤷♀️
ummefatema's review against another edition
5.0
"My husband is in the kitchen.
He is channelling his anger, practising his outrage. I am the wooden cutting board banged against the countertop. I am the clattering plates flung into the cupboards. I am the unwashed glass being thrown to the floor. Shatter and shards and diamond sparkle of tiny pieces. My hips and thighs and breasts and buttocks. Irreversible crashing sounds, a fragile sight of brokenness as a petty tyrant indulges in a power-trip. Not for the first time, and not for the last."
I cannot put into words how much I care for this book. It‘s brutal but so important. The author won my heart with her writing. It’s not for the faint of heart but I’d encourage everyone to read this if they can take it.
My copy is full of highlights now because every word the author has written is crucial.
“I am the woman with wings, the woman who can fly and fuck at will. I have smuggled this woman out of the oppressive landscape of small-town India. I need to smuggle her out of her history, out of the do’s and don’ts for good Indian girls.”
He is channelling his anger, practising his outrage. I am the wooden cutting board banged against the countertop. I am the clattering plates flung into the cupboards. I am the unwashed glass being thrown to the floor. Shatter and shards and diamond sparkle of tiny pieces. My hips and thighs and breasts and buttocks. Irreversible crashing sounds, a fragile sight of brokenness as a petty tyrant indulges in a power-trip. Not for the first time, and not for the last."
I cannot put into words how much I care for this book. It‘s brutal but so important. The author won my heart with her writing. It’s not for the faint of heart but I’d encourage everyone to read this if they can take it.
My copy is full of highlights now because every word the author has written is crucial.
“I am the woman with wings, the woman who can fly and fuck at will. I have smuggled this woman out of the oppressive landscape of small-town India. I need to smuggle her out of her history, out of the do’s and don’ts for good Indian girls.”
scarletohhara's review against another edition
4.0
Must read. For everyone.
If you are a woman, read this book and tell yourself how bad some people in this world could be. If you are a man, read it to know the atrocities women have to put up with. If you are a parent, read this to know that you have to support your girl and teach your boy to be a sensitive human being. And if you are a citizen of the world, read it to know how harsh the world is and how quick it is to judge, in many cases.
The soft-gore, emotional abuse , physical torture and the story hit a nerve with me because it could have happened to any of us. And as 90s Indian women, brought up to be modern by our parents, educated, after having been told that the sky is really the limit for us, most of us have known deep in our hearts that a horror like this could still happen to us. We count ourselves lucky when we lead normal lives, as sad and ironic as that sounds.
Reading this book also brought the lives of so many friends whom I've known to have gone through torture like this. And I wept a little for them all, again.
If you are a woman, read this book and tell yourself how bad some people in this world could be. If you are a man, read it to know the atrocities women have to put up with. If you are a parent, read this to know that you have to support your girl and teach your boy to be a sensitive human being. And if you are a citizen of the world, read it to know how harsh the world is and how quick it is to judge, in many cases.
The soft-gore, emotional abuse , physical torture and the story hit a nerve with me because it could have happened to any of us. And as 90s Indian women, brought up to be modern by our parents, educated, after having been told that the sky is really the limit for us, most of us have known deep in our hearts that a horror like this could still happen to us. We count ourselves lucky when we lead normal lives, as sad and ironic as that sounds.
Reading this book also brought the lives of so many friends whom I've known to have gone through torture like this. And I wept a little for them all, again.
hetauuu's review
4.0
4.5 stars
Meena Kandasamy takes on a highly disturbing and disturbingly real topic: domestic violence, both physical and mental. From the very first pages of When I Hit You it becomes apparent that the things done to our unnamed narrator have been so brutal that the things you're about to read about will not be for the faint of heart. But closing our eyes to the facts of situations like these, no matter how horrible, serves as nothing but a disservice to those who have to suffer from it.
At first, everything is perfect - our main character falls in love with a man who seems so passionate about equality and justice. He is a communist to the core, a proud supporter of Lenin, Marx and Mao, he believes that the bourgeoisie will one day be dethroned and people will seize the means of production. He speaks with passion and is unshakable in his stances, and our narrator, a woman of the same beliefs, cannot believe her luck. Yet now, as she is writing in hindsight, having already seen this violent marriage to its end, she sees warning signs she didn't see back then, she sees the hypocrisy of a man claiming to be for freedom and justice, yet not even regarding his own wife as human.
The fact that When I Hit You talks about the violence and abuse perpetrated by Leftist men is very important. Often when we talk about sexism and violence against women, we speak of right-wing conservative circles and men, whose traditional viewpoint on gender roles and the places of women and men in society (often dictated by religious views) put women at a disadvantage. Rarely do we mention that the people who claim to embrace the world and claim to seek justice and equality for all often don't extend that promise to women. This side needs to be explored too, it needs to be shown that sexism and misogyny is not only for the right-wing, it's ingrained into the minds of so many leftist people too, it is not a left vs. right question. It's a question of whether or not you see women as people, whether or not you are able to apply your abstract idea of equal treatment to the real life people around you.
Kandasamy's writing is not floral or frilly. It's angry, it's disappointed, it's hurt - yet at the same time, it is full of hope. When the husband tries everything he can to tear our narrator down once and for all, mentally and physically, even threatening with murder, our protagonist is able to pick up the remaining pieces of herself, stick the back together and keep going. The novel is rather fragmentary and does not move on in a strict chronological order. We know the entire time that she is going to eventually get out of the marriage, and the knowledge of that, the relief and sense of safety it brings, is peppered into the novel throughout. Life and freedom will eventually prevail, even when people around her do not believe her and her experiences, at least she is no longer experiencing them.
When I Hit You is a 250-page long gut-punch. I'll be digesting this one for a long time.
one two
tame the shrew
one two
just push through
one two
yes thank you
Meena Kandasamy takes on a highly disturbing and disturbingly real topic: domestic violence, both physical and mental. From the very first pages of When I Hit You it becomes apparent that the things done to our unnamed narrator have been so brutal that the things you're about to read about will not be for the faint of heart. But closing our eyes to the facts of situations like these, no matter how horrible, serves as nothing but a disservice to those who have to suffer from it.
At first, everything is perfect - our main character falls in love with a man who seems so passionate about equality and justice. He is a communist to the core, a proud supporter of Lenin, Marx and Mao, he believes that the bourgeoisie will one day be dethroned and people will seize the means of production. He speaks with passion and is unshakable in his stances, and our narrator, a woman of the same beliefs, cannot believe her luck. Yet now, as she is writing in hindsight, having already seen this violent marriage to its end, she sees warning signs she didn't see back then, she sees the hypocrisy of a man claiming to be for freedom and justice, yet not even regarding his own wife as human.
The fact that When I Hit You talks about the violence and abuse perpetrated by Leftist men is very important. Often when we talk about sexism and violence against women, we speak of right-wing conservative circles and men, whose traditional viewpoint on gender roles and the places of women and men in society (often dictated by religious views) put women at a disadvantage. Rarely do we mention that the people who claim to embrace the world and claim to seek justice and equality for all often don't extend that promise to women. This side needs to be explored too, it needs to be shown that sexism and misogyny is not only for the right-wing, it's ingrained into the minds of so many leftist people too, it is not a left vs. right question. It's a question of whether or not you see women as people, whether or not you are able to apply your abstract idea of equal treatment to the real life people around you.
Kandasamy's writing is not floral or frilly. It's angry, it's disappointed, it's hurt - yet at the same time, it is full of hope. When the husband tries everything he can to tear our narrator down once and for all, mentally and physically, even threatening with murder, our protagonist is able to pick up the remaining pieces of herself, stick the back together and keep going. The novel is rather fragmentary and does not move on in a strict chronological order. We know the entire time that she is going to eventually get out of the marriage, and the knowledge of that, the relief and sense of safety it brings, is peppered into the novel throughout. Life and freedom will eventually prevail, even when people around her do not believe her and her experiences, at least she is no longer experiencing them.
When I Hit You is a 250-page long gut-punch. I'll be digesting this one for a long time.