Some people come to us to definitively shape who we later become. Call it providence, fate, destiny, chance or sheer good luck, but Professor Nisha da Cunha, who died on August 11, was one such provocateur in my life.<\/p>\n
My recollections of her are perhaps common to every student of English Literature at St Xavier's College of the mid- and late 1970s \u2013 the commanding air, the measured diction while reading a text aloud in the classroom, trademark poise, impatience with students who "showed off" and her passionate guidance of those she believed had potential.<\/p>\n
It is not an exaggeration to say that we not only wanted to be as bright as she was, we actually wanted to be her, down to her short hair, piercing gaze, woven saree and large red bindi. She was simply cool. (A few years later at my first job, I mimicked an elegant "handloom" saree look. For the admiration expressed by my German bosses, the credit goes to Nisha da Cunha.)<\/p>\n
In her lifetime, Da Cunha wore many caps, all of them distinguished and successful: scholar, teacher, writer and theatre director. Born in 1934 into a prominent, highly cultured family, she spent part of her childhood in Germany during the Second World War, deeply affected by the horrors she had witnessed.<\/p>\n
She studied English at Miranda House in New Delhi and her postgraduate degree was at Newnham College, Cambridge. She was at St Xavier's College for approximately 25 years, becoming head of the English department there.<\/p>\n
Her retirement from teaching in 1985, was the fortuitous beginning of her literary career. In fact, she was already 57 when Old Cypress: Stories (1991) was published. Other works followed: The Permanence of Grief (1993), Set my Heart in Aspic (1997-\u201998), No Black, No White: Short Stories (2001), Of Age and Merry Wisdom (2001) and The Quiet of the Birds: Collected Stories (2005).<\/p>\n
Da Cunha inhabited worlds beyond literature, turning to a broader engagement with the arts, also directing plays by major dramatists in productions such as Chekhov's Three Sisters and Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba. She also wrote about Goa and old Bombay.<\/p>\n
Her literary contribution is particularly significant for its topicality today. Her distinctly female voice carries poignancy and melancholia that goes beyond the mere plot and character of a short story that, in obedience to its genre, carries a twist in the tale. Her story often started where the dramatic event had ended. Loss, separation, death and rejection are major tropes in her work.<\/p>\n
Da Cunha skilfully explored desire, memory, longing and the sheer inanity of women's daily preoccupations in contrast to the raw inner worlds that we also inhabit and that are the only spaces for our freedom. The characters she wrote about were not mere victims. It is also true however, that the kind of women presented in those stories would still not have found redemption today, so how far have they travelled?<\/p>\n
A compelling reason then, for the continued relevance of her writing.<\/p>\n
She also examined ageing with clinical, unsentimental ease. Older women, older friends and companions, came into their own; sexual, comical, unapologetic, strutting on the stage as major presences commanding attention but also our unease with the revelations.<\/p>\n
The past, in Da Cunha's work was sometimes a hungry monster banishing older worlds, allowing nostalgia to reign in their place. She often wrote of things usually left unsaid.<\/p>\n
The Old Cypress is on author Jerry Pinto's list of the 25 best Indian fiction books in English.<\/p>\n
A Mumbai Mirror article in 2025 says that da Cunha at 91 was still reading and talking about books. "The thought of writing never leaves,\u201d she said. A poignant epitaph.<\/p>\n
Two incidents I shall never forget, encapsulate her essence as educator and mentor: I once submitted an assignment on Jacobean drama after visiting every city library to prepare my sheets of (hand-written, no computers) notes. I also extensively quoted Professor Una Ellis-Fermor, one of the foremost literary critics on the Jacobean Age.<\/p>\n