Paper Details

Name: Kirandeep Kaur
Country: India

Year: 2026
Volume: Vol-13, issue-2, Year-2026 (July-December)
Page Number: 24-31
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22917507

ABSTRACT
“Solo-living is not an easy ride but I advocate it as an essential life experience to meet yourself. It has transformed me as no other experience might have.”
-Summa Tekur –
(p.230)1
This paper aims to analyse personal narrative in “Table for One’, by Summa Tekur, on the basis of Choice Feminism’. Feminism is an ideology of social, political, economic, personal, educational rights and opportunities for all genders. It calls for breaking barriers and improving educational, professional and interpersonal opportunities and outcome for women. When a woman dares to break social barriers to carve her own life style, it is known as an act of Choice Feminism. Summa Tekur choosing solo-living after her marriage shattered, was a courageous act. Ten years solo-living experience has been penned down in her book `Table for One’, which was published in the year 2023:
As the title indicates, it is about a person who books a table in a restaurant or lays a table at home, only for one person. It represents that person is living alone and nobody is there to accompany her/him to a restaurant or sit with her/him at a table at home also. It is narrative of solo-living by the author. So, it can be said a personal/autobiographical account of her life journey during last ten years. When a woman dares to break gender barriers and traditional familial set up with her independent decision, she has to face many hurdles. Tekur too faced many hurdles to establish her identity and authority when she opted to change her life-style. She narrates with examples from her personal life how she was able to cope with finances to sustain herself; how she was able to cope with her anxiety and fear; how she was able to cope with her physical safety; how she was able to cope with her emotional welfare; how she was able to draw boundaries for intruders and finally, how she was able to prepare herself for her end journey. She herself admits at the end of the book that solo living transformed her as a person who approached every situation with the question “why” and “what not”?. She became more logical, mature in thinking and became emotionally stronger to meet any challenges life threw at her.

Key Words: Choice-Feminism, solo-living, narrative, logical, mature