Nots & Crosses is a graphic novel, illustrating the biography of Phoolan Devi (1963-2001), who was also known as the Queen Bandit of India, and is portrayed as the reincarnation of Ching Shih (1775-1844), the most dreaded female pirate of China. This narrative features re-contextualized and thought provoking quotes by famous personalities on the lives of these women, illuminating the issues pertaining to oppression and how the notion of being powerful and strong, somehow, came to mean “To be tough and brutal like a man.”
The title “Nots & Crosses” is based on how girls are not supposed to act a certain way and all the obstructions and barriers faced by these women, this is what the “Nots” represent and the crosses are for how they crossed over these prejudices and defined their own path despite of being restricted and told not to.
Days passed by and my wounds began to heal. There was a thick layer
of disappointment settling around me. My own father despised me.
A girl child is a curse. She should
have never left her husband’s house.
How could you even
say that, Buppa? You
think that I should
have let him abuse
me night and day?
33
Men are taught to apologize
for their weaknesses, and
women for their strengths.
Lois Wyse
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