The Mistress of Spices

by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

New York: Anchor Books, 1997
338 pp.

Reviewed by Bansari Mitra

(Editor's intro: Bansari Mitra received her Ph.D.
in English from SUNY, Buffalo, in 1995.
She has taught at Satyawati College,Delhi,
and George Mason University, Virginia. -- c. j. wallia)

At the very beginning of her novel, Chitra Divakaruni describes India
as a "land of ardent poetry and aquamarine feathers." That brief phrase
sums up all the magic of the east, the exotic land viewed by western eyes.
The Mistress of Spices is about magic, wielded by a woman masquerading
as an old and bent creature, but in reality, vibrant, eager for life,
hungry with desires. Tilo, the mistress of spices, has many disguises and
names that reveal her multiple identities. Chameleon like, she keeps
changing throughout the novel, making clear how complex is the problem of
identity crisis that Indians try to cope with in a foreign land.
Accordingly, the narrator changes her name many times, like Bharati
Mukherjee's Jyoti-Jasmine-Jane; from Nayan Tara to Bhagyavati to Tilottama
and finally to Maya, the most appropriate name, since it means spell or
enchantment; she has to change her identities many times in order to
arrive at a final definition of her selfhood.
The spice shop, where the whole Indian community converges, is like a
microcosm in itself. We see myriads of faces there--the bougainvillea
girls, the rich men's wives, the Mohans and Jagjits and Kwesis. Each face
tells a story. Many of their immigrant dreams lie shattered in the dust,
but there are also some success stories. The ones most vivid among them
are the faces of four whose fates are inextricably linked with that of
Tilo, the spice and spell maker: Geeta, Lalita, Haroun and Raven.
The Mistress of Spices is cloaked in fantasy and the prologue, with
its strong poetic overtone convinces us that this is literature of
fantasy. However, a strong undercurrent of realism runs at the very
beginning of the novel and becomes manifest later on. What is astounding
is that this dichotomy of fantasy and reality never jars on our senses.
Divakaruni modifies ancient Indian legends and reinvents the myth of the
bird of Shampati, whose name stems from the *Ramayana,* who, Phoenix
like, rises from the ashes. The legend of Shampati, as a dominant theme,
holds the story together.
However, as the novel progresses, the fantasy element diminishes and
the realistic element becomes prominent. That is especially true of the
story of Geeta, revealing the typical conflict between Indian born parents
and their westernized daughter. It is a clash of values, especially with
the grandfather coming in between, trying to instill in his granddaughter
some of the "sterling values" he had learned in India that are hopelessly
outdated in this foreign country. The conflict comes to a head when
Geeta's parents try to arrange a match for her in India and Geeta
announces rebelliously that she is going to marry a Chicano, Juan Cordero.
According to her parents, Juan is even more of an outcast because he is
not white. Geeta moves out and the family's conflict is only resolved
when Tilo, like a medicine woman, steps in and performs her miracle with
her spices, so that, as the grandfather says, the "thorn of hate" is
plucked out from the heart.
Lalita's story does not have such a happy ending. 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 places herself in her husband's power
so completely that she is regularly beaten and bruised. In the end Tilo
saves her, not by ministering physic but by giving her a newspaper
clipping that has the address of an emergency shelter for women. Even at
that shelter she is not happy, uncertain and afraid, longing to go back to
her abusive husband, only for the comfort of staying in a home that is at
least familiar if not secure.
Haroun, the cab driver is just such a victim as Lalita, but the
mistress' timely intervention barely saves his life. Indeed, that section
is so full of tension that it becomes quite gripping, even though in
general the plot's movement is quite slow. Haroun is mugged by some
robbers at night, creeps back to his home like a wounded creature about to
die, but his neighbors and Tilo nurse him back to health, so that he can
at last plan to marry the sister of his neighbor. His luck seems to take
an upward turn, however full of obstacles his path may have been at the
beginning.
It is the last section, dealing with Raven and Tilo that knits
together the many themes that run as separate strands throughout the book.
It also vividly illustrates many of the complex conflicts that
multi-ethnic groups experience in this country. Raven's mother had
concealed from him his background, his ancestry that made him ashamed of
her. He also underwent a crisis when he took to drinks and drugs; but
finally, like the raven, a counterpart of the mythical bird Shampati, he
resurrected himself from the ashes of his old identity. It is at this
moment that Tilo helps him and is in turn helped by him.
Quite apart from the convincing blend of fantasy and realism,
Divakaruni succeeds in presenting to us a balanced picture of the world of
immigrants in America. Not all of them are winners, but not all of them
are losers either. As a former colleague of Divakaruni, whom I knew
in Presidency College, I was agreeably surprised to see that
she has made such a name for herself. Her story proves that she is one
immigrant who came to the land of opportunities under the combination of
auspicious stars. It spells a message of hope for many people in the
future.