Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

About

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is an Indian-American novelist, poet, and professor born in Kolkata, India, in 1956. She moved to the United States in 1976 to pursue graduate studies and earned a PhD in English from the University of California, Berkeley. Her writing explores immigration, cultural identity, women’s experiences, family relationships, and the intersections of mythology and contemporary life. She is particularly known for retelling stories from Indian history and Hindu epics through the perspectives of women whose voices have often been overlooked. Her acclaimed novel The Palace of Illusions (2008) reimagines the Mahabharata through the eyes of Draupadi, while The Last Queen (2021) tells the story of Maharani Jindan Kaur, the last queen of Punjab. Other notable works include The Mistress of Spices (1997) and The Forest of Enchantments (2019). Through lyrical prose and richly layered storytelling, Divakaruni examines the tensions between tradition and independence, the experience of migration, and the enduring power of women’s stories.