This is a story of human emotions— love, greed, jealousy, forbearance, desire and forgiveness— as they play out in the inner sanctum of the home. Maa revolves around four characters in a turn-of-the-nineteenth-century setting in the aftermath of the social churning caused by the Bengal Renaissance. Aurobindo Basu is the well-educated scion of a rich, influential Kayastha family. He has two wives: Manorama, the charming daughter of poverty-stricken parents whom he married against his father’ s will and who was soon disowned by his patriarchal father; and Brajarani, a beautiful, wealthy, strong-willed lady who Aurobindo was forced to marry due to the threat of disinheritance. While the old patriarch also disowned Manorama’ s son Ajit, Brajarani was unable to produce an heir. Manorama lived in dire straits but found fulfilment in caring for Ajit; in contrast, Brajarani had everything that a woman could materially desire but was bereft of her husband’ s love and was immensely resentful of her abandoned co-wife. What such a situation can do to a young, innocent mind is reflected in Ajit’ s coming of age. Maa is a period piece on the private world of Bengali women as viewed through the un