Critical Perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: Feminism and Diaspora PDF
Preview Critical Perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: Feminism and Diaspora
Critical Perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Critical Perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Feminism and Diaspora Edited by Amritjit Singh Robin E. Field Samina Najmi LEXINGTON BOOKS Lanham • Boulder • New York • London Published by Lexington Books An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www .rowman .com 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE Copyright © 2022 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Singh, Amritjit, editor. | Field, Robin E., 1976- editor. | Najmi, Samina, 1963- editor. Title: Critical perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni : feminism and diaspora / edited by Amritjit Singh, Robin E. Field and Samina Najmi. Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “Critical Perspectives on Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni explores the fiction of South Asian American writer, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, and her aesthetic of interconnectivity and wholeness. Two interviews and an essay by Divakaruni offer indispensable insights into the formal, socio-political, and thematic concerns of this multifaceted artist”—Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2021051361 (print) | LCCN 2021051362 (ebook) | ISBN 9781498556170 (cloth) | ISBN 9781498556187 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee, 1956—Criticism and interpretation. | Divakaruni, Chitra Banerjee, 1956—Interviews. Classification: LCC PS3554.I86 Z63 2022 (print) | LCC PS3554.I86 (ebook) | DDC 813.54—dc23/eng/20211019 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021051361 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021051362 ∞ ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. To the future of South Asian Literatures we imagine and write, and to our children, who inherit our stories: Baani, Reshma, Samir and Simmer Samuel and Benjamin Maya and Cyrus Nothing strengthens the judgment and quickens the conscience like individual responsibility. Nothing adds such dignity to character as the recognition of one’s self-sovereignty; the right to an equal place, everywhere conceded—a place earned by personal merit, not an artificial attainment by inheritance, wealth, family, and position. Conceding, then, that the responsibilities of life rest equally on man and woman, that their destiny is the same, they need the same preparation for time and eternity. The talk of sheltering woman from the fierce storms of life is the sheerest mockery, for they beat on her from every point of the compass, just as they do on man, and with more fatal results, for he has been trained to protect himself, to resist, and to conquer. Such are the facts in human experience, the responsibilities to find individual sovereignty. —Elizabeth Cady Stanton, 1892 Chitra Divakaruni Contents Preface xi Introduction xv Amritjit Singh and Robin E. Field PART I: FEMINIST POLITICS, FEMININE SENSIBILITIES 1 1 Between Home and the World: Situating South Asian American Feminism in the Fiction of Chitra Divakaruni 3 Nalini Iyer 2 Helping Women Help Themselves in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s Arranged Marriage and The Unknown Errors of Our Lives 19 Payel Basu 3 Woman to Woman, Sister to Sister: Feminine Connections in Divakaruni’s Mistress of Spices and Sister of My Heart 29 Liesl King 4 “Her Story” in Chitra Divakaruni and Shashi Deshpande: Re-Reading the Mahabharata from Women’s Perspectives 43 Shaweta Nanda PART II: NARRATING MEMORY AND BELONGING 59 5 The Statue of Liberty and the Secret Sharer: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s “A Perfect Life” 61 Sau-ling Cynthia Wong 6 Memory, Nostalgia, and Finding Oneself in Divakaruni’s Fiction 81 Shashikala Assella ix
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