By making her women characters use ‘silence’ as a powerful and unfailing weapon to wreak vengeance on their erring husbands, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, breaks the myth that ‘silence’ is the synonym of passivity and acceptance. There are two kinds of silence both of which are traceable in her women characters. The first kind is ‘forced silence’ inflicted on the women by the patriarchal society to subdue them and keep them in eternal bondage which is much prevalent in their post-marital life, particularly in the house of the in-laws. After a brief discussion on this kind of ‘forced silence’, this paper attempts to make a microscopic analysis of the second kind of ‘silence’ which becomes a lethal weapon in the hands of the victimized women to avenge their offenders. The ‘silence’ suppressed so long till the oppressed women reach the point of no return erupts like a volcano, the devastating effect of which is strongly felt by the menfolk only after they are abandoned once and for all. The ‘unspoken words’ of these women thus raise to the level of the two strong weapons introduced and practiced by Gandhi during the Freedom Movement, namely non-violence and non-cooperation. Divakaruni also makes her women use this weapon not just for the immediate end of ‘survival’ but for the attainment of the ultimate goal namely ‘women’s emancipation’
Volume 11 | 06-Special Issue
Pages: 1816-1819