Book Review 
Title of the Book:  The Forest Of Enchantments 
Author's Name:      Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Available on:       Amazon
 

About the Author :

Author – Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is an award-winning author of 18 books. Her themes include the Indian experience, contemporary America, women, immigration, history, myth, and the joys and challenges of living in a multicultural world. Her work has been published in over 100 magazines and anthologies and translated into 29 languages, including Dutch, Hebrew, Hindi, and Japanese. Several of her works have been made into films & plays. She has been associated with the teaching of the highly acclaimed Creative programme at the University of Houston.

Narration: The book flows like a river, and the narration is so lucid that it gives justice to the characters, the theme, including the plot. It is one such book that takes its readers along with it, and the reader is certain to look forward to turning the page after each chapter! A few moments into the Author’s note, and one can realize how the author has put her heart and soul into creating this book, and the result is purely spectacular!

Book Cover & Title: The book cover is captivating and alluring, and is sure to capture the attention of the readers.

Content:

When I picked up this book, I had a personal thought that it would be the same as any other mythological fiction! But I was so wrong! This is, in fact, Sitayan, that is the story of Ram & Sita narrated from the eyes of the main protagonist Sita! And like a fresh dew, it imparts freshness to the perspective of how we have been seeing one of the most popular epics of India, i.e, The Ramayana!

The Author has created her magic in transforming the image of Sita to someone bold, rebellious, and opinionated, and not just someone weak or silently submissive. This is retelling of the classic love story of Ram and Sita but with a sprinkle of freshness and a touch of feminism where the Author brings out multiple dimensions of the protagonist Sita, who is a dutiful daughter, a supportive sister, a loving wife, a sensual lover, a courageous & loyal life partner, a caring daughter-in-law, a fierce environmentalist and a magnificent warrior.

The story begins when Valmiki shared the manuscript of Ramayan with Sita while she was living in the ashram after being exiled by her husband, Ram. Sita, while going through the Ramayana, was satisfied that each detail had been captured correctly by Valmiki, but then she shows her displeasure as she realizes that Valmiki has failed to understand what a woman truly feels. After all, it is not easy to understand a woman’s life, the heartbreak at the core of her joys, her unexpected alliances and desires, her negotiations where, in the hope of keeping one treasure safe, she must give up on another.
And it’s that when Valmiki asked her to pen down her part of the story, which she named as ‘Sitayan’. I personally loved it when Sita, with all her initial inhibitions, takes it as a mission to pen down her own emotions while ways of dealing with life.

Sita, through her pen, takes us back to the journey where one can actually visualize her life ( such is the power of storytelling), starting from the stage where she was a kid till the moment she had to tragically leave her husband, Ram, due to unavoidable circumstances. Divakaruni successfully manages to bring in the air of mystery and jaw-dropping plot twists even to the most famous and well-known tragic love story of Ram & Sita! The scene where young Sita spends a moment with the Shiva Dhanu, or the bow that Ram breaks to win the Swayamvar and finally marry Sita, is amazingly portrayed. The unique point in this book is that through her brilliance, the author has brought into life all the female characters and has given them their own voices be it Sunaina, Sita’s farsighted mother, Urmila, Laxman’s supportive wife; Mandodari, Ravan’s talented wife, Ahalya, wife of Rishi Gautam, Surpanakha, Ravan’s sister, wronged by two men & even Kaikeyi, Ram’s stepmother & an accomplished charioteer.

The portrayal of Ram and Sita as humans with their weaknesses, their silent yet sizzling chemistry, their longings, their desires, their anguish, and even their passion as two souls deeply in love makes the reader feel that they are traversing through the terrains of intense love story and not just reading some mythological epic.

The language is delicate, and yet it showcases the strength of character and intentions of the protagonists whenever required. The book delves into aspects of feminine feelings and is successful in rejecting prejudices and biases against women. It shows many aspects of Sita. She proves to be the strength that Ram seeks in his moments of despair, while she also endures extreme pain, all alone in the hands of Ravana, without breaking down, thereby failing all his evil tactics.

When Ram says, “In my kingdom, every man will have a voice, no matter how humble he is,” Sita wants to ask, “What about the women?”. The author tries hard to question the patriarchy and shows that Sita was brave and a positive change-maker. Her initial days of handling her marital chords with her in-laws have been showcased beautifully, and so are her adventures when she endures every pain with her better half in the jungles. Sita is also shown as a woman who sometimes says things that she regrets later, just like we human beings; she gets angry and stubbornly wishes for things and later realizes her grave mistake, only to show that we are all humans and have our flaws. Most importantly, the male protagonists, be it the Maryada-Purushottam Ram, Dashrath, the chaotic King, Lakshman, the dutiful brother, or Ravan, the demon king, everyone has rightfully got their due in the book.

Ram, in his greed to become the perfect ruler of his kingdom, fails in the role of a husband and keeps hurting the pride of his beloved from time to time. Even after knowing Sita and having spent a considerable part of his life with her, he is the one who expels his pregnant wife to the jungle, and all this while blatantly lying to her about his love for her. Just like many men. He does not think twice before asking her to conduct Agni Pariksha again and again to prove her chastity and in all these scenes the language used is so poignant that every woman can feel it when she has been left alone to prove herself over and over again, when she has to take on the whole society and its harsh rules all alone, when she musters courage to face all taunts and judgments against her, when she endures the emotional pain inflicted upon her by her own beloved…all alone.

One unique aspect of the book is dealing with the Nature of Love through various relationships. I loved the climax and Sita’s response, when she boldly defies her husband’s biased viewpoint, perfectly summed up the book for me. She says:

“Because if I do what you demand, society will use my action forever after to judge other women. Even when they aren’t guilty, the burden of proving their innocence will fall on them. And society will say, Why not? Even Queen Sita went through it. I can’t do that to them.”

Some of my favourite lines from the book are:-

–Write our story too. For always we’ve been pushed into corners, trivialized, misunderstood, blamed, forgotten- or maligned and used as cautionary tales.

–‘Love can make us forget our own needs. It can make us strong even when the world is collapsing  around us.’

–‘Once mistrust has wounded the love, it can’t be fully healed again.’

–‘Love is the strongest intoxicant, the drink of deepest oblivion.’

–‘It’s important to speak your mind to the person you are going to marry.’

-‘ How ironic that the joyous times we like to hold on to are the most fleeting while the saddest ones clutch at us, refusing to let go.’

-‘Endure as we do. Endure your challenges. Endure – It means taking the challenges thrown at us and dealing with them as intelligently as we know until we grow stronger than them.’

–‘Every darkness is edged with light.’

I would highly recommend this book to my readers as it promises a very engaging experience.

Link for the Book: Click Here

Love,

Chinmayee