Gender, Authority, and Duty: Women's Political Voice in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's The Forest of Enchantments

Background: The Forest of Enchantments written by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni tells another story of the Ramayana, from Sita’s point of view, making the female perspective an integral part of the story told from the point of view of male domination, kingship, and duty. Methods: Qualitative literary research involving close reading of some selected passages of the novel. The analysis will focus on such issues as gendered political authority, the exercise of authority by women in the patriarchal system, and the connection between the voice of women and justice. Results: Political authority in the novel is gendered and predominantly masculine though women take part in the process of governing through giving advice, knowledge, negotiating, and decision-making. Sita’s mother gives advice to the king of Mithila while remaining officially outside of the kingship. Sita poses the question of women’s exclusion from ruling and opposes the political ideology according to which voice was granted to every man but no women. Moreover, the concept of “duty” becomes the instrument to make women obedient but Sita uses this language when negotiating with herself. Sita’s challenge to Ram is focused on the right to be informed, listened to and responded to. Conclusion: The novel shows the political agency of women both in taking the formal political power and in challenging the authority and negotiating decisions. Novelty: This paper goes against the popular feminist reading of Sita by analyzing the interconnected ideas of authority, invisibility of female rule, duty, and the right to speak out.