CHITRA BANERJEE DIVAKARUNI

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

was born in Calcutta and spent the first nineteen years of her life in India. She moved to the United States to continue her studies, getting a Master's degree from Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, and a Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley, both in English. For several years she has been interested in issues involving women, and has worked with Afghani women refugees and women from dysfunctional families, as well as in shelters for battered women. Since 1991 she has been president of MAITRI, a South Asian women's service which she helped found in the San Francisco area. She has written several books of poetry, and her work has been included in over 30 anthologies. Her book of short stories, Arranged Marriage, which has won critical acclaim and the 1996 American Book Award, the Bay Area Book Reviewers and PEN Oakland awards for fiction. She has two published novels: The Mistress of Spices and Sister of my Heart. For twenty years Divakaruni lived in the Bay Area and taught at Foothill College. In 1997 she moved to Texas with her husband and two children, where she taught creative writing at the University of Houston. After a 2-year stay in California, she has returned to Houston with her family.
According to a UH press release, the Mistress of Spices is soon to be made into a major motion picture.

Bibliography

One Amazing Thing

2010





A group of nine are trapped in the visa office at an Indian Consulate after a massive earthquake in an American city. Two visa officers on the verge of an adulterous affair; Jiang, a Chinese–Indian woman in her last years; her gifted teenage granddaughter Lily; an ex-soldier haunted by guilt; Uma, an Indian–American girl bewildered by her parents’ decision to return to Kolkata after twenty years; Tariq, a young Muslim man angry with the new America; and an enraged and bitter elderly white couple. As they wait to be rescued—or to die—they begin to tell each other stories, each recalling ‘one amazing thing’ in their life, sharing things they have never spoken of before. Their tales are tragic and life-affirming, revealing what it means to be human and the incredible power of storytelling.





The Palace of Illusions
2008

   Narrated by Panchaali, the wife of the five pandava brothers,The Palace of illusions finally gives a woman's take on the timeless tale that is the Mahabharat. Tracing Panchaali's lie from fiery birth and lonely childhood,where her beloved brother is her only true companion;through her complicated friendship with the enighmatic KRISHNA; to marriage, motherhood and her secret attraction to the mysterious man who is her husbands most dangerous enemy - it's a deeply human story aout a woman born into a man's world...... 

"Divakaruni gives us a racy and romantic tale, the story of not just Draupadi and the God Krishna, but also of the most tragic hero in the whole wide world – Karna...." 




Queen  of Dreams
2004




In this novel, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni spins a fresh, enchanting story of transformation that is as lyrical as it is dramatic

“This story of an emotionally distant mother and a daughter trying to find herself transcends cultural boundaries. Queen of Dreams combines the elements that Divakaruni is known for, the Indian American experience and magical realism, in a fresh mix. The tale succeeds on two levels. She effectively takes the reader into an immigrant culture but she also shows the common ground that lies in a world that some would find foreign. The search for identity and a sense of emotional completion is not confined to small corners of the world. It is a dilemma that all readers can understand.” 





The Vine of Desire
2002

The Vine of Desire is a novel of extraordinary depth and sensitivity. Through the eyes of people caught in the clash of cultures, Divakaruni reveals the rewards and the perils of breaking free from the past and the complicated, often contradictory emotions that shape the women's passage to independence....... 

“Divakaruni is gifted with dramatic inventiveness, lyrical, sensual language, the ability to interweave many points of view with ease…The Vine of Desire offers many delight"










The Unknown Errors of Our Lives

2001 









In this collection, featuring tales set in India and America, Divakaruni illuminates the transformations of personal landscapes, real and imagined, brought about by the choices men and women make at every stage of their lives. The stories include "Love Of A Good Man," a tale of a happily married Indian woman who must confront her past when her long-estranged father begs to meet his only grandson; "Mrs. Dutta Writes A Letter," (selected for Best American Short Stories, 1999), where a widow living in her son's Calfornia home discovers that her old world ways are an embarrassment to her daughter-in-law; "The Blooming Season For Cacti," where two women, uprooted from their native land by violence and deception, find unexpected solace in each other; and the title story where an artist is faced with her fiance's past a week before her wedding must make an important decision. 





Sisters of My Heart

1999





“Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s account of family life in Bengal is warm and richly detailed. Hers is one of the most strikingly lyrical voices writing about the lives of Indian women today.” 




What an irresistibly absorbing immersion in the pleasure and anguish of growing up passionate in a world of duty, where each comfort is hedged with a constraint and love unsettles every plan. Sister of My Heart may be alive with exotic detail but its emotions are very recognizable




The Mistress of Spices

1997 

The Mistress of Spices is unique in that it is written with a blend of prose and poetry. The book has a very mystical quality to it, and, as Divakaruni puts it, “I wrote in a spirit of play, collapsing the divisions between the realistic world of twentieth century America and the timeless one of myth and magic in my attempt to create a modern fable.”

A splendid novel, beautifully conceived and crafted.






Arranged Marriage

1995 

Arranged Marriage, Chitra’s first collection of stories, focuses on women from India caught between two worlds. The characters are “both liberated and trapped by cultural changes,” struggling to carve out an identity of their own.




Divakaruni not only conveys emotions with stunning accuracy, she also transforms the outer world—every room and article of clothing, every instance of snow, rain, and sunshine—into reflections of the soul










 For The Young Readers




The Conch Bearer

2003

Mythical, mystical — and impossible to put down, The Conch Bearer is literary fiction of the highest order. Action, adventure and magic combine in this compelling quest fantasy that whisks readers to a far away land and to a reading experience they won’t soon forget. The Conch Bearer is a feast for the senses with a multitude of colors, smells, sounds, and textures. It’s a feast of the emotions as readers feel fear, hope, joy, trepidation, sadness, and wonder — right along with the main characters. And it’s a feast for adventure-lovers – a fast paced story that races across contemporary India to a dramatic climax in the Himalayas.




Neela: Victory Song

2000




It is 1939, and 12-year-old Neela Sen and her family are preparing for the wedding of Neela's older sister. Neela knows her parents will soon be arranging a betrothal for her, too. She is far more interested in thinking about other things, including India's growing movement for independence from Great Britain. When her father is jailed following a march against British rule, Neela takes matters into her own hands and goes to Calcutta to find him. 

 




Poetry

• The Reason for Nasturtiums (1990)
• Black Candle (1991)
• Leaving Yuba City (1997)
• Indian Movie, New Jersey


 Anthologies 

• Multitude:Cross Cultural Readings for Writers (1993) 
• We Too Sing America (1997) California Uncovered: Stories for the 21st Century (2004)