Abstract
This article investigates the intersection of women’s identity and nationalist ideology in Qurratulain Hyder’s Fireflies in the Mist, highlighting how nationalism functions as a deeply gendered structure that both mobilises and marginalises female subjects in twentieth-century South Asia. The study argues that Hyder’s novel functions as a sustained critique of nationalist discourse by unveiling how women’s identities are constructed, constrained, and instrumentalised within nation-building projects, while simultaneously demonstrating moments of resistance that illuminate the entangled dynamics of gender and power in postcolonial contexts. Drawing on feminist and postcolonial theoretical frameworks, the research utilises close textual analysis to examine narrative strategies, characterisation, and ideological critique. Particular attention is given to the character of Deepali Sarkar, whose political engagement embodies the paradox of nationalist inclusion: women are valorised as symbols of moral purity and sacrifice, yet denied autonomous agency and meaningful political authority. The analysis highlights that Hyder destabilises the notion of gender-neutral national progress by foregrounding women’s struggles for selfhood amid overlapping patriarchal and nationalist regimes. Furthermore, the study presents how the novel articulates an implicit call for intersectional feminist resistance, challenging both nationalist idealism and ingrained patriarchal hierarchies. By situating Fireflies in the Mist within debates on gendered nationalism and postcolonial literary resistance, this research paper advances understanding of the structural exclusions embedded in nation-making and underscores literature’s capacity to negotiate and critique the limits of political belonging for women.
