Book Review: The Forest of Enchantments (by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni)

                                                         

Confession: Read this novel as I was completely blown away by the author’s previous work.

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is one of the most prolific female voices in the Indian literature scene. I have also read her previous offering, The Palace of Illusions. She has certainly carved her own niche as feministic writer. The Palace of Illusions was certainly a masterpiece, and I wish I had started this blog several years earlier, so I could have reviewed this book also. While Palace is the Mahabharata told through the eyes of Draupadi, in The Forest of Enchantments we read the Ramayana as recited by Sita; by that, the author implies that this is the Sitayana. As I type this on MS Word, the program automatically decides that Ramayana is an English word while Sitayana is not. And therein lies the problem in our society, where we recognize and laud the achievements of our male Gods and rarely acknowledge the contributions of our female deities.

There is no point in me going into any specifics of the plot. In Forest, Ram and Ravan both play their roles as villains. It might seem heretic to the most religious of readers, but Banerjee’s main intention is to give a voice to Sita: her aches and emotions that are so often discounted by the mainstream portrayals of this epic. As a result, it is not the war between Ram and Ravan that is highlighted, but it is a gentler story told through a greatly wronged woman caught between her husband who is bound by his extreme sense of ‘duty’ and a Rakshas who lusts after her. Women in India, thousands of years later, find themselves in the exact same position; subjugated and exploited by men.

I have no complaints about Banerjee’s writing. She is one of my favourite Indian authors, along with Amitav Ghosh. Her prose is subtle and beautiful. But I did not love this book as much as Palace. I could not put my finger on the exact reason for this. Probably there are large gaps in the source material as to what Sita went through during her banishment and subsequent kidnapping periods? Probably Banerjee’s creativity let her down a little bit while elucidating Sita’s suffering? It is not the most perfect book by Banerjee, but it is certainly the most important version of the Ramayana out there. Do read if you can.

My rating: 3/5

Image source: amazon.in