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Trauma and Reconciliation in the Indian Diasporic Enclave: A Reading of Chitra Banerjee
Divakaruni’s The Mistress of Spices.
Transnational shifting is an age-old phenomenon that is still evident within the present
context, either voluntarily or by force. In the literary scene, many writers have indulged themselves in
highlighting the experiences of such immigrants. The experiences of immigrants which involve issues
of dislocation, alienation, assimilation, expatriation and re-examination of the self have gained
significance in these writings. Immigrant journeys begin with a single, drastic step – the act of
leaving home and one’s set place in it, of leaving the safe confines of home for unknown lands. In
these new worlds, the Indian immigrants also readjust and reinvent themselves, while struggling to
find their place in an alien landscape, and in the process, they secure some gains and also incur deep
emotional losses. In addition to retaining their cultural values and ethnic identity, the Indian
immigrants often face other difficult tasks of survival, within a society that is conspicuously different
from their own. While some build cocoons around themselves as a refuse from cultural dilemmas and
from the experienced hostility in the new country, others try their best to forge a workable synthesis
between their native culture and that of the new set-up.
Much of Divakaruni’s work deals with the immigrant experience, an important theme in the
mosaic of American society. Jaina C. Sanga writes:
Moved by the dual forces of the preimmigration and postimmigration conditions,
touched by the pains of women in male-dominated societies, and inspired by the desire
to preserve memory, Divakaruni first began writing poetry, then moved on to short
fiction, and eventually to novels.1
Divakaruni is an award winning author and poet. She has been published in over fifty magazines,
including The Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker, and her writing has been included in over fifty
anthologies. Her books have been translated into sixteen languages, including Dutch, Hebrew,
Russian and Japanese, while two of her books have also been made into movies. Divakaruni was
born as Chitralekha Banerjee in 1957 in Calcutta, India and she spent the first nineteen years of her
life in India. At the age of nineteen in 1976, 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. She claims:
Coming to the US gave me the distance I needed to look back on my culture with
objectivity, to pick out what I valued and realize what I didn't agree with. One of the
latter was the double standards in effect in many areas for women, and I strove to
remove these from my life.2
Her major publications include three volumes of poetry: The Reason for Nasturtiums (1990), Black
Candle (1991) and Leaving Yuba City (1997); two collections of short stories: Arranged Marriage
(1995) and The Unknown Errors of Our Lives (2001); four novels: The Mistress of Spices (1997),
Sister of My Heart (1999), The Vine of Desire (2002) and Queen of Dreams (2003); and children’s
books, Neela: Victory Song (2002) and The Conch Bearer (2004).
In Indian diasporic writing, the sense of alienation, homelessness, expatriation and state of
exile that the immigrant experiences in a foreign space have been constantly pondered upon and these
issues raise the necessity to question the concept of the self for the immigrant. Manju Jaidka has
described the condition of the immigrant as follows:
The loss of one’s homeland is invariably the consequence of having consciously opted
for another…having made a choice [the immigrant] is doomed to accept and suffer it,
to hang out there for better or worse. And yet the loss is unignorable: the feeling it
brings with it is that of an exile.3
1
Jaina C.Sanga,ed., South Asian Literature in English: An Encyclopedia, (Connecticut:
Greenwood Press, 2004)85
2
"Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni." 2 Jan 2009 http://www.mx.org/divakaruni/html.
3
Manju Jaidka, “ The Writer as Trishanku: Indian Writing in a Foreign Space”,
Somdatta Mandal ed., The Diasporic Imagination: Asian American Writing, Theory,
Poetry and Performing Arts , (New Delhi: Prestige Books, 2000)12
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Edward Said, in his essay Reflections on Exile, has also described the notion of exile:
Exile is the unhealable rift between a human being and a native place, between the self
and the true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted. The achievements of
exile are permanently undermined by the loss of something left behind forever.4
With the creations of new state and new diasporas, history and circumstances have produced more
wanderers, nomads, vagrants, unassimilated in the structures of institutional power. The diaspora has
come to assume an empowered space in spite of remaining on the peripheries of mainstream culture
and it now produces subversive narratives which may complicate questions of identity. Homi Bhabha
writes:
The boundary that secures the cohesive limts of the western nation may imperceptibly
turn into a contentious internal liminality providing a place from which to speak, both
of, and as, the minority, the exilic, the marginal and the emergent.5
It is this very location that is turned into an advantage and with this new opportunity, arises numerous
writings which voice the concerns of the minority. A number of Indian diasporic writers, have
established their reputations, predominantly within the last decade, by articulating their concerns.
Aijaz Ahmad has asserted that “the upper class Indian who chooses to live in the metropolitan country
is called the ‘diasporic Indian’ and exile itself becomes a condition of the soul.” 6 When we speak of
the Indian diaspora, writers generally refer to persons of Indian birth or ethnicity living abroad. In
earlier times, it was often as a result of induced emigration or indenture but in more recent decades
usually by free choice and often for economic, artistic or social advantage. For most of the older
diasporic Indians, there is the unease of the dislocated and uprooted sense who either by choice or by
compulsion had abandoned home for another adopted country. The conditions of the diasporic Indian
characterize the tensions and contradictions in the midst of cross cultural encounters because they
shuttle between two different cultures.
The first generation Indian immigrants often insist on preserving and recreating the traditions
of their homeland within the host country which in other words means that they are isolating their
children from the life that surrounds them from day to day. Thus, conflicts arise between the second
generation immigrants and their parents. Geetanjali Singh Chanda asserts that these first generation
Indians “are thrice alienated – from the India they left behind, from their new host country and from
their children.”7 For the first generation settlers, the traumas of migration, dispersal and exile from
their native country as well as the discrimination they experienced have become potent forces in the
formation of their alienated attitude. Their participation in the adopted society is limited due to both
external constraints of prejudices and discrimination and the internal constraints embedded within
cultural values and norms. However, this differs from the experiences and mind set of the subsequent
generations which can be attributed mostly to the environment in which they have grown up. This, in
turn, has a significant impact on the individual’s concept of the self. For the younger generation of
the Indian diaspora, home is where their feet are and their hearts have been set upon this home. They
have assimilated themselves with the host culture but at the same time, they cannot escape the
haunting presence of the Indian culture that their parents cling onto and also the negative attitude of
the host culture towards them. Writers of the Indian diaspora such as Divakaruni reflect these inter-
generational relations and conflicts in their writings. Uma Parameswaran opines:
I am well aware of the vast differences between the younger Indian generation’s
attitudes to “home” and their parents’…many (younger generation) have felt the stings

4
Edward Said, Reflections on Exile and other Literary and Cultural Essays, (London:
Granta, 2000)101
5
Homi K. Bhabha, The Location of Culture, (London: Routledge, 1994)149
6
Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, (New Delhi: Oxford UP,
1992)86.
7
Geetanjali Singh Chanda, “ Nostalgia, Duty and Desire: Home in Indian Diaspora
Literature”,T Vijay Kumar, et al. ed, Focus India: Postcolonial Narratives of the
Nation, (New Delhi: Pencraft International, 2007)159

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of racism…Often both oppressor and victim outgrow their roles but some of the
victims carry the scars of trauma all their lives.
In The Mistress of Mistress , the recognizably “real” contemporary world is depicted through
a narrative which relates the trauma and pain of the Indian immigrants on foreign lands. Erupting into
this world is the mysticism and magic of the east, linking these people of the present, to the past and
even to their roots. She asserts:
I write to share my culture and my world- with readers who know it intimately
already, and with readers for whom the books are a discovery process. I write to
establish unlikely connections.8
In keeping with this idea, she projects the experiences of a number of Indian immigrants and the quest
for self in an alien land in order to have a stable self. The eastern emphasis on family and community
as against the western idea of individual freedom posits dilemma in the construction of the self for
Indian immigrants living in America. They are torn between the country of origin and a desire to live
in the American dream. The self that they exhibit is ultimately a fragmented one, neither belonging
here nor there. Divakaruni advocates an acceptance of the two cultures in order to arrive at a definite
self. In her works, she exerts that a reluctance to mingle in mainstream American culture could pose
as an obstacle in maintaining security. She says:
It’s okay to be an Indian person who loves Indian culture but now I’m an American
citizen and committed to making life in this country better. We need to remain secure
in our own identity but participate fully in the culture, politics and daily life of
America. The important part of integration is that you don’t give up, you share.9
She does not demand a resistance of the old ways and a shedding of the eastern culture but
advocates an embracing of both the east and the west. She urges the Indian immigrants to see America
as a land of opportunities, of dreams coming true while also celebrating the rich culture of the east.
She says that she sees herself as “a listener, a facilitator, a connector to people,” and, “to me, the art of
dissolving boundaries is what living is all about”.10 In this way, the protagonists can finally overcome
the sense of unbelonging, the crisis of the self and in the process carve significant inroads towards
reconstructing their own selves. In her novels, she also denotes how the west paves a way to
overthrow the suffocating selflessness which is imposed by the patriarchal society for an Indian
woman. By immersing into the mainstream culture and embracing its ways, an Indian woman can
break free from the patriarchal demands and find her own happiness. By breaking free from the
constraints of traditions, these women can exert a greater degree of control over their own lives than
they do in the traditional Indian set up and therefore, become responsible for their own selves.
Divakaruni is concerned in her writings with this quest for self for the Indian immigrants which may
begin with their attempts to assimilate. It might begin with a change in name and continue through
change in dress, accent, eating habits and trying to adapt to the new culture. The choices are made
because of the need for acceptance of the self when there is constant fear of being discriminated.
Post-colonial literature by itself, constantly engages itself on identity crisis and the self’s
relationship with place. The self has been eroded by dislocation, resulting from migration or
enslavement and by cultural contempt, the conscious or unconscious exploitation of personality and
culture by imperialism, often resulting in alienation as the native culture is oppressed by the
supposedly superior culture.11 Immigrants are often engaged with a struggle to find their true selves or
to seek out a lucid recognition of their identity. Ila Rathor comments on the concept of the self for the
Indian diaspora:
8
Monica Bhide, “Food, culture and lifestyle: A date with Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni”,
A Life of Spice 30 March 2009 www.chitradivakaruni.com/books.html
9
Uma Girish, “Straddling Two Cultures: An Interview With Chitra Banerjee
Divakaruni” 12 Sept 2009 www.calitreview.com/58.
10
"Dissolving Boundaries."
http://headlines.entertainmentmarket.com/boldtype.divakaruni.article,html
11
Bill Ashcroft, et al., Introduction, Readings on New Literatures in English, ed.
Neera, Singh, (New Delhi: IGNOU, 2002)9
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The diaspora communities live in multicultural environments. In the process, the self
is removed from its specific surroundings and what we have is a reinforced struggle
for survival and re-identification. It is a process of re-constructing the self in a new
surrounding, an alien environment.12
This quest for the definition of self also becomes the main feature of the protagonists in Divakaruni’s
novels who are caught within the flux of tradition and modernity. Neither can they completely detach
themselves from the past nor do they have any certitude in the future. However, they ultimately
escape dangers of depersonalization and self-destruction and in the end ultimately they reach a re-
creation or realization of their own selves. In the novels, there is a sense of temporariness, a longing
for a future which is,different from the present and as such, all attempts at defining the self, and the
subsequent effort of the self which is thus defined, are motivated by a need to overcome the present
displacement and alienation. Traces of the past often linger in the subconscious and they have a
tendency to surface either through memory or collectivity. This clinging to the past may sometimes
necessitate some of the Indian immigrants to view the people of the adopted country as the “other”
and therefore, may hamper the construction of the self towards a sense of belonging. On the concept
of the “self”, Jasbir Jain comments:
The “self” may remain in constant need of an “other” and thus adopt a resistant
attitude, or it may progress from a resistant to a dialogic self, willing to give and
belong, willing to transcend the ego.13
The recreation of the self is composed of relatively permanent self-assessments, which include
personality attributes, knowledge of one's skills and abilities, one's occupation and hobbies, and an
awareness of one's physical attributes. It also corresponds to hopes, fears, standards, goals, and
threats. Ila Rathor claims that the sense of the self
is defined through environment, past experiences, collective memories, possessions
and even the lack of it. In this process the space occupied by, the place it is located in,
is crucial to the construction of the self.14
True to this statement, we find that Divakaruni’s characters in the selected novel also define
themselves based on the factors mentioned in the same. There is the duality or rather the clear
demarcation of a western exterior and an Indian interior to be seen in the major characters. The
fictional homes in the novels are located in the west, but, because they are homes of exiles,
immigrants and diaspora citizens, they signify estrangement, dislocation and fragmentation. The
Mistress of Spices offers a close look at a wide spectrum of Indians residing in the diaspora. It is a
novel that deals with the migration of Indians to America and the disillusionment that follows it. In
this novel, Divakaruni has effectively dealt with the theme of dislocation and confusion. She talks
about the exploitation of the immigrants, the fixated sense of nostalgia that cripples them, the crisis of
the self and a variety of other issues. The focus of the novel is on Tilottama (henceforth referred to as
Tilo), the main protagonist as well as the narrator of the story while the novel tries to unravel the
complicated layers of cross- cultural reality through a series of adventures which Tilo undertakes
during her journey from her village in India to the exploits with the pirates, then to the island, to her
enclosed life in California and finally to her emergence into the new world of America. As she keeps
changing throughout the novel, it only clarifies the complexity of the crisis of the self that Indians
have to struggle with in a foreign land. According to Neil Goldman:
In The Mistress of Spices, Tilo’s migration is used as a metaphor; it stands for
movement, change and struggle for survival. It demands adventure, risk and
transformation. Nayan Tara becomes Bhagyavati, Bhagyavati becomes Tilotamma and
Tilo becomes Maya.10

12
Ila Rathor, “Alone Among Aliens” Jain, Jasbir, ed. Dislocations and
Multiculturalisms. (Jaipur: Rawat, 2004)148
13
Jasbir Jain ed., Dislocations and Multiculturalisms, (Jaipur: Rawat, 2004)124
14
Ila Rathor, “Alone Among Aliens” Jain, Jasbir, ed. Dislocations and
Multiculturalisms. (Jaipur: Rawat, 2004)149
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Accordingly, the narrator changes her name many times, like Bharati Mukherjee's Jyoti-Jasmine-Jane
in Jasmine(1989), from Nayan Tara to Bhagyavati to Tilottama and finally to Maya and she does so in
order to arrive at a final definition of her selfhood. At every step, Tilo revolts against her fate and the
path drawn for her. Her transformation from Nayan Tara to Bhagyavati has its own pressures and
trauma. She is born in an Indian village only to be rejected as a dowryless, undesireable female child,
a curse to the family. She describes her birth in the following manner:
The midwife cried out at the veiny cowl over my face, and the fortune teller in the
rainy-filled evening shook his head sorrowfully at my father. They named me Nayan
Tara, Star of the Eye, but my parents’ faces were heavy with fallen hope at another
girlchild and this one colored like mud.12
Her loneliness and estrangement has started from this very moment and as a child, she is left
unattended and unwanted. Out of this loneliness grows her power to see beyond the discernible and
her fame spreads and she gains respect from the villagers. But she begins to feel restless and yearns
for a variation in her life. She says:
That same salt wind would sweep through me. Restlessness. How tiresome my life
had become, the endless praise, the songs of adulation, the mountain of gifts, my
parents’ fearful deference.13
Her plight can be regarded as representative of what Nagendra Kumar had said on Indian women:
In India a woman’s fate is decided very early in her life because the parents start
discriminating between their male and female child from the very beginning. It is
incessantly hammered on the girl’s consciousness that she has to move somewhere
else and must be submissive and assimilative, come what may. Thus she starts a life of
duality and conflict since her childhood. This conflict gets multiplied with migration to
another country.14
True to this statement, Nayan Tara(Tilo) faces discrimination from her childhood and she can
only resort to instilling fear among the villagers and her own family in order to feel wanted and to
belong. But she then senses that the only way she can find relief and security is by leaving her friends
and family. In her extreme effort to be rid of her dreary existence, she calls out to the pirates who sail
the ocean and end up getting her family killed while she is captured and given a new name:
“Bhagyavati, Bringer of Luck, for so I was to be for them.” In time, she manages to overthrow the
chief of the pirates and make herself queen but the pain of displacement and isolation cannot be
shaken off by this act of vengeance. She says:
… I overthrew the chief to become queen of the pirates (for what else I could be I did
know) that pain ate at me. Vengeance did not appease it, as I thought it would.15
She begins to seek out other means to ignite her dull existence and cries out to the ocean for
answers as they plunder ships and amass “meaningless” wealth on their ship. Then an encounter with
the snakes of the ocean introduces her to the island of spice and at this point, she desires nothing more
than to learn the art of the spices. The snakes beg her not to go and their warning foretells the events
to come in her life:
She will lose everything, foolish one. Sight, voice, name. Perhaps even her
name….see the spice glow under her skin, sign of her destiny.16
But Tilo is adamant and she hopes that this is the place that she has always
longed for. On the island, she is thoroughly trained to be a mistress of spices under the
guidance of the First Mother. When Tilo pledges her service to the spices, she is obligated to
leave her own younger form and assume the body of an old woman. She also has to journey to
Oakland, California where she opens a shop and administers spices to cure and heal the people
who visit the store. She feels that she would no longer be haunted by restlessness for she has
established her home with the spices:
Once a mistress has taken on her magic Mistress-Body, she is never to look on
her reflection again. It is the rule that causes me no grief, for I know without
looking how old I am, and how far from beautiful. That too I have accepted.18
But her arrival in this foreign land twists her hopes and dreams. In Oakland, Tilo witnesses the
various tribulations that engulf her customers, especially the Indian immigrants. In continuum with
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the title, each chapter is named after a spice and discusses the trials and tribulations of an individual
and the special characteristics of the spices: turmeric, the hope for rebirth; chili, the cleanser of evil;
fennel, to cool tempers; fenugreek, to render the body sweet and kalo jire to reduce pain and suffering.
In this manner, the reader gets a glimpse into a range of problems that surround the life of the
diasporic Indian. Tilo sees them as a despairing and an excruciating lot who carry about them the
mark, in their attitudes, sensibilities and convictions, of the alienated, traumatized immigrant:
It seems right that I should have been here always, that I should understand
without words their longing for the ways they choose to leave behind when they
chose America. Their shame for that longing…19
The story of Geeta, in the text, reveals the typical conflict between Indian born parents
and their westernized children. First generation Indian immigrants often construct new homes
in the adopted country taking their cues from their original homes in India. They continue to
uphold the Indian customs and traditions, hanging on to Indian attire and provisions and
refusing to accept any western value that would dilute their Indianness. For the second
generation diasporic Indians, the Indian values that the older generations try to instill, such as
that of Geeta’s grandfather, only appear outdated and confined, so, it results in a clash of
values between the two generations. In the novel, Divakaruni seeks to synthesize traditions
with modern values and also shows how it results in a cross cultural fertilization in which both
the parents who stand for tradition and Geeta who represents modern ethos influence each
other and bring in remarkable changes in each other. For Geeta, Tilo mixes several ingredients,
ginger for deeper courage, fenugreek for healing breaks and amchur for deciding right. Geeta’s
predicament stems from the fact that she is part of a paradigmatic diaspora family where a
clash between the first generation and second generation Indian immigrants are inevitable. Her
parents have given her plenty of independence but they cannot accept her boyfriend, a Chicano
named Juan, and Geeta, the second generation immigrant, is shocked by the elements of
racism that she perceives in her parents’ reaction to Juan and she moves out.

According to her parents, Juan is even more of an outcast because he is not white. On the
concept of marriage, Divakaruni opines:
Marriage in the United States is about finding the 'right mate,' an attractive person to
fulfill one's fantasies, however, in India, people marry to perpetuate the culture and
strengthen family ties. 27
Divakaruni claims that for the Indians, including the first generation Indian immigrants living abroad,
marriage is still an event that defines culture and tradition. The second generation Indian immigrants
have adopted the western ways and therefore, base marriage on love and attraction. As such, one can
understand the conflict between the westernized Geeta and her tradition-bound family. Geeta moves
out and the family’s conflict is resolved only when Tilo steps in and performs her miracle with her
spices so that there can be harmony in the family. As Tilo listens to Geeta’s story, Tilo is reminded of
her own longing for the American. She exclaims:
And suddenly, for no reason at all, I think of my American. Geeta, like you I too am
learning how love like a rope of ground glass can snake around your heart and pull
you, bleeding.28
These lines reflect the pull of America that Tilo fights against and the emotional burden she bears
because of her inability to detach herself from the control of the spices. Though she struggles
tremendously to remain true to the pledge that she has made to the spices, she fails to withstand the
magnetism of the outside world and she finally ventures out to meet Raven, as well as Geeta and
Haroun, the cab driver. Even with these actions, she continues to feel delimited because she cannot let
go of the past, of her life on the island and her time spent among the spices. So, she remains caught
between the two worlds and in turn, causes her to question her own self and who she really is.
O spices, I say as I lower my stiff body onto the hard floor where I will toss unsleeping all this
night. My voice is tired with persuading, tinged with doubt. Can I not love you and him both.
Why must I choose. The spices do not answer.29

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There is also Lalita who has left all her true sensibilities in India and moved to
America with her newly wedded husband, Ahuja. Married to an abusive, tyrannical man, she
casts aside her dreams of setting up her own tailor's shop in India, follows her husband to an
alien land where she has no support, no friend or job. She constantly has to bear Ahuja’s
abuses because she places herself in his power and is, therefore, defenseless. Tilo recalls:
Here is what she wants to tell me, only how can she, it is not right that a woman
should say such things about her man: All day at home is so lonely…Tears she
cannot stop…and Ahuja shouting when he returns home to her swollen eyes.20
Haroun, another immigrant from Kashmir, India, is mugged by some robbers at night and he
has to creep back to his home after being severely wounded. We also witness the disturbing
effect that immigration has on children in the case of Jagjit. He is constantly abused, verbally
and physically, at school and his unfamiliarity with English makes him all the more insecure
with the result that he becomes a frightened boy who hides behind his mother in public:
Then there is Jagjit, the shy frightened boy transformed to Jag by the endless hostility and abuse he
has to bear for his accent and turban:
In the playground they try to pull it off his head, green turban the color of a parrot’s
breast. They dangle the cloth from their fingertips and laugh at his long, uncut hair.
And push him down.32
He then began to wear a protective armour, one of wariness and seclusion, because of the numerous
abuses. His fear of rejection and discrimination, of not belonging, has sent him into invisibility, into
dark spaces, and finally into hiding:
Tilo understands his trouble and she secretly tucks cinnamon in his turban to help him find a friend.
The spice seems to have worked because the next time Tilo sees him, he has acquired American
friends and his crisis of unbelonging and discrimination appear to have been solved. However, his
assimilation into the American way of life seems to have caused him more harm than good. He has
befriended gang members, adorns western clothing and hits the road with a yearning for the power of
steel blade and gun. He assumes that this way, he has finally found others who understand him when
earlier there had been none to help him.
Uma Parameswaran gives a reason for these acts of second generation immigrants like Jagjit:
The desire to act and dress like everyone else is one way for visible minority children
to make themselves invisible; and another is to downplay racial slurs as one would
skinniness or obesity or various disabilities that are targets of torments.35
Even Tilo shudders when she realizes that the cure she had administered earlier on has gone terribly
wrong and she can only accept this as a punishment meted out to her by the spices.
It is the last section, dealing with Raven and Tilo that knits together the many themes that run as
separate strands throughout the book. Tilo’s affection for the American causes her dilemma, and her
oscillation between the old and the new world. Manju Jaidka claims that for Tilo, this pull between
the past and the present:
Posits divergent points of view that can never be coerced into a whole. Straddling
these worlds, moving in search of roots from the one to the other, the protagonist must
make a choice. This choice would necessarily involve giving up the one in favour of
the other. This is what makes it painful.37
The plight of these people touch the core of Tilo’s heart and despite the spices’
restriction that she must refrain from any emotional involvement with her customers, she
slowly begins to open up towards them. She eventually dissolves all boundaries which isolate
her from the outside world. It is ironical that Tilo who has been assigned to heal the homesick
and the troubled should be an alienated, isolated and confused immigrant who is in no way
different from her customers. Therefore, whenever she learns about their pain, she recognizes
them as akin to the afflictions that fall upon her as well. She harbors within her the desire to
interact and engage with the outside world and also to grow young and beautiful the way she
really feels inside. She laments:
Sometimes it fills me with a heaviness, lake of black ice, when I think that
across the entire length of this land not one person knows who I am.22
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At the same time, she is hesitant to break her pledge to the spices and as a result, she
becomes torn between the old world and the new. Soon, however, she cannot fight the
persistent urge to get a taste of the world beyond her own and one day, she is tempted to step
out of her shop to inspect Haroun’s new cab. This action can be taken as Tilo’s first step
towards the transformation of the self because here, she follows her own desire despite the
spices’ warnings. From this moment, she begins to transgress the precincts of her own shop
that disable her to find her own contentment and security. She says:
I must step onto the forbidden concrete floor of America, leaving behind the
store as I am supposed to do.23
She ventures out to solve the conflict in Geeta’s family and succeeds in convincing
Geeta that her family has agreed to her views when she pays her a surprise visit at her own
office. Tilo's timely intervention also barely saves Haroun’s life when he is mugged by
robbers. Ignoring the voices of the spices, she tracks him down and with his neighbour,
Hameeda, she nurses him back to health, so that he can at last plan to marry Hameeda. Tilo’s
approach to Lalita’s plight also contradicts with the art of the spices, especially in terms of
using magic to cure any form of illness. She saves this pathetic woman, not by ministering
magic but by giving her a newspaper clipping that has the address of an emergency shelter for
women. And when Lalita finds herself unhappy and homesick in the shelter, it is only Tilo’s
encouragement that enables her to define herself not in terms of her duties as a wife but in
terms of a search for her own happiness and her inner desires. However, it can also be noted
that Tilo’s betrayal of the spices does not go unpunished. Her effort to help Jagjit turns terribly
wrong when the cinnamon she administers to him only leads to his blending with gang
members and his fixation on steel blades and guns. As such she remains shuttled in between
India and America, wavering up to the last part of the novel, between the promise of America
and the duties of the old-world.
She then transforms herself into a young woman, feeling guilty about her “self-indulgence”
but decides to brave the retribution that she would have to face. She experiences new emotions with
Raven, falling in love and sharing joy and laughter that she had never known existed:
My American’s voice is glazed and heavy like medicine honey, the words catching in
its bitter sweetness, the memory of things lost. They wrench open in me chambers I
thought I’d shut for always.39
However, it can also be perceived that their initial affair is based on misapprehension and curiosity.
Besides being a lover, Raven also stands for the new world. Tilo longs to transgress her enclosed life
ruled by the spices and to step into the world of America as represented by Raven. Once outside the
premises of her confinement, Tilo relishes greedily the objects of the modern, American world:
You who lounge lazy through Saks and Nordstrom, who pick your ennuied, everyday
path through Neiman Marcus, can you understand how I love the anonymity of this,
my first American store, so different from my spice shop? The blandness of neon
lights that fall evenly without shadow on shiny Mop & Glo floors…How I love the
aisles and aisles of things folded hung high…Aloe vera lotions…silverplatters, fishing
rods and chiffon nighties… I am drunk with it.40
Raven, the American, on the other hand, is drawn towards Tilo’s mystical power and her Indianness.
This is evident when he claims that the bougainvillea girls are not authentic Indians:
“You’re authentic in a way they’ll never be,” he adds. Authentic. A curious word to use. “ What do
you mean authentic?” I ask. “You know, real. Real Indian.” Raven, despite their fizzy laughter, their
lipstick and lace, the bougainvillea girls are in their way as Indians as I and who is to say which of us
is more real.41
Thus, the cross-cultural encounter between the two highlights the misconceptions and the wide rift
that often developed between different cultures which can obscure a co-mingling in an unconstructive
way and may result in discrimination and segregation. Their tie, forces each other to question their
own selves and their differences as well. By relating their pasts, they both realize how they have
either romanticized or completely rejected each other’s world. Tilo remarks:

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It is fearful-exhilarating to glimpse the parallels in our lives, the differences. To think
that Raven holds a legacy of power. To wonder why then has he come to me. And to
hope. Ah my American, perhaps at last I have found someone with whom I can share
how it is to live the Mistress life, that beautiful, terrible burden.42
Besides being a lover, Raven also represents America, the new, exciting world beyond
the periphery of her shop while the spice shop is a manifestation of the old world, of duties and
traditions. As she becomes more attracted to him, she is filled with a desire to hang on to him.
However, the spices would not permit her to unite with the American for fear that Tilo would
be totally immersed in the American culture and hence, would dissolve all ties with them. An
emotional involvement with an American would, therefore, strip her of all her powers:
“When you begin to weave your desire into your vision,” the Old One told us, “the true
seeing is taken from you. You grow confused, and the spices no longer obey you.”25
Despite this warning, Tilo cannot control the new desire that has stirred up in her. She
sincerely strives to follow the wishes of the spices, yet she cannot wipe away the picture of
Raven from her mind. Though she can feel the first sign of the anger of the spices, she is
helpless against this new burst of emotion and therefore, she has to venture on.
Raven himself is a native American whose mother had concealed his true identity from
him. However, in his youth, he had met his father and his tribe which had then led him to
question his identity. In utter confusion, he had taken to drugs and drinks but finally manages
to arrive at a definite awareness of his own inner self, by accepting both his native American
and his American identities. His encounter with Tilo offers him the possibility to empty his
heart out and to be relieved of his burden. As he relates his life story, it enables Tilo to
scrutinize her own self and what she lacks in life. He sees in Tilo, not the tattered, old woman
but a young woman, full of zest for life. Even Tilo can sense the transformation that Raven
brings as she relates:
Even my name takes on a new texture in his mouth, the vowels shorter and
sharper, the consonants more defined. My American, in all ways you are
reshaping me…he says… “This body, I know it’s not the real you.”27
He is determined to love her despite her protests and Tilo is cautious, though she loves
him for fear that the spices would inflict their wrath not only upon her but also upon Raven.
Tilo sees in Raven a reflection of her own life and by listening to his experiences and his
acceptance of his dual identities, she begins to examine her own self. She rejoices for having
found someone who shares the same burden that she has been carrying for a while:
My breath comes faster as I listen. It is fearful-exhilarating to glimpse the parallels in
our lives, the differences. To think that Raven too holds a legacy of power. To wonder why
then has he come to me. And to hope. Ah, my American, perhaps at last I have found someone
with whom I can share how it is to live the Mistress life, that beautiful, terrible burden.28
She now longs to venture outside her enclosed life ruled by the spices and to step into
the world of America. At the same time, the memories of her past keep haunting her even as
she indulges herself in the new world with Raven. She says:
Every footstep is a memory, like walking on broken bones…First Mother, who would
have thought the taste of salt-spray on my lips as I walk beside the man I must not love, would
bring this longing for that simpler time when you made all decisions for me.29
She does not want to discard these memories altogether and her wish is to embrace the
two cultures, of India and America. She aspires to break up all the cultural barriers that stand
between her old world and the new, attractive world. Her desire is to merge her world which is
filled with spices with the new world and this is the reason why she evokes the help of ginger
when she decides to step out for the first time:
Golden ginger used by the healer Charak to relight the fire that simmers in the
belly, may your bright burning course up my sluggish veins. Outside, America
is flinging itself against the walls of my store, calling in its many-tongued
voice. Give me strength to answer.30

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But the spices would never agree because they demand her full dedication but Tilo is
no longer afraid to act; in a final act of renewal, she destroys all her ties with the spices
because they refuse to share her with the outside world by discarding the bundle of spices she
carries with her at the time. In the end, she assumes her normal form, having been transformed
into the more comprehensible, mortal woman that she truly is. With this new concept of her
own self, she can now accept Raven’s love for her because he can now love her as she truly is,
as the normal, content, middle aged woman named Maya. When Raven asks what kind of a
name she wants, she replies:
One that spans my land and yours, India and America, for I belong to both
now. Is there such a name?38
He chooses Maya for her and she gladly accepts the same, because it means “illusion,
spell, enchantment, the power that keeps this imperfect world going day after day.”39 She has
finally broken free of all ties and asserts, “I who now have only myself to hold me up”. 40 In the
end, she has crossed the threshold that opens up to a whole new world and she is now entirely
responsible for her own self.
Thus, in the novel, we find a complex woman confused over her position in the world
and always seeking several ways to alter her existence because she is dissatisfied with what life
has to offer. She consistently examines her own self and in confronting her own helplessness,
isolation and desires, she undergoes a process of self-development. In maintaining her Indian
entity as Maya and stepping out into America with Raven at the same time, she dissolves
boundaries between the two worlds. The narrative ends on a positive note and Tilo, along with
a majority of the characters depicted within the novel, achieve happiness in their painful search
for greater individual freedom by moving beyond the limits of their enclosures.The novel
clearly spell a message of hope and the ability to transcend limitations and hurdles that occur
when two cultures confront each other. She also exerts the significance of finding one’s own
self. These are aspects defined by one’s own desires, wishes, passions, freedom and individual
achievements and at the same time, Divakaruni denotes how one can establish a healthy
relationship with others within the realms of an inherently secure and gratifying aura. It is
seen that choice has now well entered, the picture of the Indian diasporic community. A
realization of the self, for a diaporic Indian, does not necessarily mean the destruction of
traditions. It means they can choose what traditions they want to keep. They can also be
involved in the American culture while continuing to retain their ethnic identities. They can put
high values on family ties, while observing the Indian tradition and also keep in touch with
their other Indian peers.At the same time, they can also be successful in carrying out their
roles as Americans, thus, adopting the good values of both cultures. Divakaruni, herself an
immigrant, has become a major voice of the Indian diaspora, even as she chronicles their
struggles, their losses and their tales of reinvention and redemption. Divakaruni has put into
words what millions of immigrants would find hard to articulate, especially within the confines
of the dilemmas that have been faced by women who move from the locales and traditions of
home and into the brave new universe outside. She proves that a novel can be a window to a
culture and that it offers an insightful passage into another world and another life.

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