The Cilappatikäram - Introduction

Kannaki undergoes precisely such an "incandescence" when she hurls her severed breast on Maturai. By her unprecedented action, she is, in fact inscribing her curse, writing it as a lasting record, stamping it on the face of Maturai. So effective is her curse that a fire soon engulfs the city and burns it down. Nowhere in literature that I am aware of is the power of a woman's body - a body that has, throughout history, been possessed, exploited, and abused by patriarchy - so fiercely depicted. Abandoned women such as Kannaki have the power to strike terror in the hearts of men and are therefore dreaded.