Somadeva 05/23/13

The Role of Disguise in Classical India

“The Red Lotus of Chastity” is overflowing with cunning characters who rely on deception, particularly disguise, to accomplish their goals. The corrupt nun’s pupil, Siddhikari, relies on disguise to gain the trust of a wealthy merchant, from whom she schemes to steal all of his money, harming everyone who tries  to get in her way (Somadeva  1276). For Siddhikari, the disguise is necessary to gain the trust of another in order to acquire wealth.

Similarly, the corrupt nun also relies on deception and disguise as she plots to convince the chaste Devasmita to “yield to the demands of sense and element” by being unfaithful to her husband, Guhasena, while he is away (Somadeva 1277). The nun disguises herself as a holy person who can remember past lives in order to convince Devasmita to abandon her virtue. Again, the need for disguise is an integral part of accomplishing one’s goals because it is necessary to gain the trust of another who would not willingly comply with one’s demands any other way.

Fortunately, Devasmita is clever and does not fall for the nun’s deception. Devising her own plan to evade the wicked nun, she sets out to save her husband “with her presence of mind” (Somadeva 1278). Modeling her plan after  the story of a cunning wife, Saktimati, who relies on disguise to save her husband, Devasmita and her maids “disguised themselves as merchants” in order to expose the men who tried to seduce her so they could not seek revenge upon her husband (Somadeva 1279).

As a result of Devasmita’s ingenious plot, she managed to protect both her chastity and her husband, and she was “honored by all upright people” (Somadeva 1279). The role of disguise in“The Red Lotus of Chastity” suggests that the shrewdness of women makes them a great asset to men. Men and women protect one another; while men are able to work to provide for and protect their wives, women’s greatest asset is their ability to use their mind to craft ways of being useful and fulfilling their desires.

Work Cited

Somadeva. “The Red Lotus of Chastity.” The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin            Puchner. Vol. 1. New York: W.W. Norton, 2013.